Twelve Days
by s2lou
Summary: Well, if you don't guess what this is... twelve shots starring our three favourite couples. Suicidal, but then... i know I'm LATE. Theme 12: Making Up For Lost Time. Shin Ran. Last but not least!
1. The Best Gift

**A****uthor's note: I know, I know, those twelve days are supposed to be **_**after**_** Christmas. But then, alas, I will not be there at the time… and since my best friend generously (sadistically) provided me with a list of twelve themes and there's precisely twelve days left until Christmas and I'm really BORED, I'll try and update once a day. I'll try. One per evening, but that's not a promise… schoolwork has rights upon me as well.**

**If I owned DC and/or MK, I'd very probably be murdered in my bed by loads of angered fans. Which isn't quite the kind of fate I seek.**

**Theme #1: the Best Gift (that just **_**calls**_** for Shinichi and Ran!)**

**Consequently, as a title:**

**-**

**The Best Gift**

**-**

"Shinichi!"

The dark silhouette standing in the shade of the streetlamp turned just in time for a nearly-running Ran to crash against him, causing him to stagger lightly. Her eyes and hands immediately lifted, scanning his face, feeling his shoulders, making sure it was really him. Shinichi smiled a bit testily; being both her best friend and a detective, he could well guess the reason for her agitation – could well perceive how his call from, what, five minutes before, saying he was just the corner of the street and would she come down, when she was probably thinking him miles away, had caused the mix of happiness and shock which her puzzled eyes, hesitant smile and flowing words now openly exposed.

"Shinichi – it's you – it's really you – what are you doing here? Why didn't you tell me you were coming back? how long are you going to stay – Shinichi, are you all right?" the end of her speech dropping an octave from puzzlement to concern.

The young detective forced a truer smile onto his lips – he probably appeared too grave and too silent, compared with what cheerfulness (however fake) he usual held up during their telephone conversations, and her own happiness at seeing him again. In one quick glance, he devoured each feature of her delicate face, the worried expression of her light blue eyes; he couldn't help thinking this might be the last chance he got to see that sight.

"I'm fine," he pretended, and turned, somehow stiff in the way he held his back. "C'mon, let's walk." He felt Ran's alarmed gaze following him before herself did.

They walked at random for some minutes – not quite silent, but entertaining no other discussion than the average health, school, 'what-have-you-been-doing' inquiries. Shinichi was definitely out of the blue, and Ran was too puzzled to push him on into whatever it was he wanted to tell her.

They walked on through the early evening gloom, meeting practically nobody and nothing but the slender shapes of the streetlamps whose irregular glow punctuated their way. It was under one of those that Shinichi eventually stopped, facing her decisively, and in that full golden light Ran could see what she hadn't seen, rather, had not dared discern before – the weariness stamped on his face like a mask, his drawn-out features, the hard corners of his mouth and sharp glint of blue in his eyes, no doubt resulting from many a sleepless night spent in detecting and investigating cases. He stood there, taller, graver than she, more experienced too than the boy who'd left her to worry in Tropical Land one year before.

"Shinichi…" Nothing but a mere whisper of his name escaped her in a trickle of voice, and she lapsed again into silence. He was watching her intensely; more intensely, perhaps, than he used to. It would have troubled her but a few months before; now, she held the stare and waited. She had grown to learn patience.

"I wanted to say… Merry Christmas," he said, with a clumsy smile, scratching the back of his head in a familiar gesture that had not, and would not, change.

"Christmas isn't until another twelve days," she remarked.

"I know… but I may not be able to with it to you then," he said delicately. Then, in a sudden and irresistible burst of sincerity, "Ran, I'm going to leave Japan."

Her reaction was exactly what he'd expected it to be; what he hadn't anticipated was the effect that reaction would have upon _him_. Her eyes widened slightly, and her mouth opened only to be speechless, and her whole expression was such that he wanted to take her face between his palms and kiss her, tell her that he'd come back, that even dead, he would come back… Hearing her stammering, panicked words was an attack directed straight to his heart.

"What? When? Where to? Will you be back… soon?" She looked on the edge of crying – he knew that expression well. He used to see it a lot as Conan, and her voice heavy with strangled sobs was maybe worse than all.

"It's… related to the case I'm dealing… well, trying to deal with," he said cautiously, well aware that any other shock might shatter her before his eyes. "I have to team up with the FBI in America…"

"America…" she nodded, drawing in the long breaths that would force back the tears. "I see… and… when are you leaving?"

"Tomorrow morning." Better the blunt truth tan trying to slight her question easily – or so he thought. Her face did crumple, however, and she turned away from him, one hand raised as a bad attempt to hide her tears before he could see them. It failed. Shinichi heard something crackle, though whether inside her or inside himself, he could not say.

"Ran, I…" Words indignantly deserted him. It was his body that acted while his mind was still struggling. He slid his arms around her waist, feeling her stiffen, and rested his chin on her shoulder, anxious at first, then relieved that her back relaxed against her chest. She was sobbing softly, as fragile as a child, and he felt swelling inside him the usual feelings of helpless anger and want to protect her – he was furious, furious against himself to be walking out on her once more, and yet to have the nerve to ask her to wait up for him again. "I'm sorry – I'm so sorry." No other word would come out, and he was left with repeating those endlessly.

At last, she sighed – the long, slow sigh of tears rarefying – and she leant her head backwards, against his shoulder. The simple gesture of acceptance made his heart leap in pleasure and in pain – he did not deserve this and he knew it. He wanted to tell her how much he felt this, how much he wished he could stay with her now; words of love that would at least drive away some of this burden – instead, he buried his face in the curve of her neck and hugged her closer, tighter, some of his own tears losing themselves in the silky mass of her hair.

"How long do you think you'll be gone?" she asked softly – her voice ran smooth and clear in the night's coldness.

"I'm not certain…" was the muffled reply. "A few weeks. Maybe a month."

"And then you'll be back for good?" There was a sting of weakened hope in her voice which he would've hate to put an end to. He slid one arm up to encircle her shoulders, the other keeping securely around her waist, pressing her back against his chest, and answered,

"… I hope so."

Ran slowly disentangled herself from his arms and turned to face him with a small and, so he suspected, fake smile. "With both you and Conan-kun gone to America, things are going to get rather confused around here," she said lightly, keeping an even voice. "Be sure to check on him if you go through New York, 'kay? Tell him I miss him."

"I certainly shall," Shinichi agreed, but there was an off inflexion in his voice which she couldn't quite define. And then, in a total change of tone and manner, "Sooo… what'cha want for Christmas?"

This sure had the desired effect; a truer, more genuine smile forced its way up to her lips and she exclaimed, "Excuse me? Where does _that_ come from?"

He grinned, relieved. "Well… you know," with a careless shrug, "you can find things in the USA which aren't so common here in Japan. So if you have any gift idea in mind – something you'd like and I could find you…"

Curiously, all Ran's amusement then vanished in thin air. Her gaze fell serious, and she turned silently away.

"Ran?"

"Ne, Shinichi…" she asked this hesitantly, avoiding his quizzical gaze onto her. "You… you won't happen to get seduced by a beautiful blonde FBI agent, will you?"

This did trigger something in Shinichi's assumed self-control. But Ran had no time to study the slight change of his expression; she had barely turned back to him that his lips crashed against hers, making her gasp in surprise and grasp at his shoulders. A few seconds of shock – then her eyes slit shut.

After the first minutes of rather awkward experiment, both felt encouraged enough to snuggle closer to each other in a somewhat more officially kissing position. –Thanks to Ran's intervention, mostly, they had often watched romantic films starring the beautiful nurse and the handsome soldier lost in the storm – this felt nothing like it. There was certainly not any perfection in either their situation or their kiss; they were far too hesitant and clumsy to make it plain perfect. They were both first-timers and therefore extremely embarrassed, and they had to gasp for air more often than they felt they should; but as it were it _was_ perfect, in spite of all its imperfections.

Shinichi was neither too eager nor too direct. His lips were soft and gentle, as well their contact as the effect they produced on Ran, and it was but gradually that his arm slid around her waist again, pressing their bodies closer together. And it was easily, naturally without being forced or pushed to, that Ran's mouth opened slightly to his when he asked for it – and, more generally, the kiss began from then on to deepen in a way that was irretrievable. His hands were actually wandering – on her waist, up her back, in her hair, in her neck, but never, ever anywhere that may shock or hurt her – and those caresses were wonderful, simple butterfly touches leaving her skin tingling through her clothes.

It was that kind of moment which should, in all logic, last forever – but doesn't. For some reason of his own, time doesn't stop, nor even stretches in some kind of ever-lasting bliss, like most people pretend it does - this did last long, but not long enough to make either of them forget it was only temporary. And, when their lips eventually parted, that sense of ephemeral grew stronger – which I why Ran hid her face in Shinichi's shoulder, and he cradled her gently in his arms, and both rejoiced in that warmth of each other that would soon disappear.

"Be careful," came Ran's voice, breakable like a piece of glass in the cold.

"Uh?"

"That case you've got to deal with the FBI – it won't be easy, will it? Is there any danger involved for you? You already had to disappear once–" her voice had turned hard and bitter, and she didn't push on. "Can it be really dangerous?"

Shinichi's subsequent silence answered her question eloquently enough even before his voice came out, stiffly, "… possibly." And then silence again; he didn't seem to want to talk about that. Ran suppressed a shudder and hugged him harder.

"Be careful."

He stroke her hair lightly, enjoying the softness and limpidity of the black locks running smoothly between his fingers. "Don't worry. I promised you to come back to you, whether alive or dead, remember?" he reminded her un-seriously.

"I'd rather have you alive than dead," Ran grumbled, and he thought he heard something else that ran like, "risk-taking mystery-geek' or something similar, but the corners of her mouth were twitching and he sensed her amused enough – high-spirited enough to add easily,

"So? Any idea for a present I could get you?"

Ran marked a pause. She may never want to admit this to him – she tightened their embrace at the thought and felt him touch her hair with a feather kiss in response – for now, the simple certainty of his presence beside her, be it only for a moment, of her arms around her shoulders and his lips upon her lips, was the best gift he could ever offer her.

-

**I'm offering you fluff for Christmas! Enjoy it while it lasts! And, if you really enjoyed it… well, you know what to do. Hopefully, see you tomorrow!**


	2. In The Shop

**Author's note: Because, of course, with such a fic, I couldn't fail to use this carol… and because the image of Heiji wandering through a shopping centre and pushing his way through a crowd of shoppers looking for a gift for Kazuha was just too much fun.**

**Theme #9: For the first day of Christmas…**

**I don't own anything, neither the manga nor the carol! As if you didn't all know!**

**-**

**In The Shop**

**-**

Okay, this made it official: Heiji Hattori hated Christmas.

Well, not really _hated_ Christmas – presents and cake and parties were okay, mostly. But what he really disliked was everything else – standing up in queues and being stuck in traffic jams an all the fuss around gifts – gift-wrapping, gift-stamping and, worse of it all, gift-buying. Which was why he was now sitting on a green bench in the middle of a remarkably crowded shopping mall, feeling just like that runner at Marathon who'd finally died of exhaustion.

Shopping malls in normal times were already madness, but shopping malls during Christmas season were direct suicide. They were full of exasperated costumers who'd all waited until the last ten days to do their Christmas shopping and who had _not_ a good reason for being thus late – like, a triple murder case which had knocked the breath out of him. They were all running about and looking put-upon, bumping against his legs and then glaring at him as though it was his fault there was no room to move in the place.

And they were all the same over and over again – obaasan, obaasan, obaasan, little kids, elder brothers, obaasan, obaasan, mother with three children and her last on her back, looking harassed, obaasan, obaasan… _bis repetita._

Besides, he concluded as his last decisive argument about the suicide-inducting potential of shopping centres, there was the utmost bad taste in Christmas decorations most of the shop windows displayed – trim trees and ivy-and-holly garlands and golden stars may be alright, but were crystal cherubs, mechanical Santas or even Christmas carols really, really necessary to keep people in the, ah, Christmas spirit? (As far as those high-pitched chimes could be considered as carols. It was difficult to distinguish anything more than an irregular shrill, but Heiji was fairly sure he'd heard something that more or less resembled the first bars of 'Holy Night'.)

So, he thought quietly, this was the situation – _he'd spent three bloody hours in this over-charged shopping centre, looking for presents all over the place!_

Oh, that wasn't strictly true, either. He _had_ found presents; in fact, he only missed but one. The worst, of course – Kazuha's. And nothing – nothing seemed to fit her enough to qualify as an actual present.

He sighed deeply an, pulling himself to her feet, began to push his way through the throng of costumers commuting between this and this shop, and all without exception glared at him s he broke through the flux of their to-and-fro-ing.

After many struggles, he finally reached the doorstep of one random shop – the bells had stopped murdering 'Holy Night' and were now hard at salvaging either 'Good King Wenceslas' or 'Joy To The World', there was no closer approximation. He peeped inside. Shoes, shoes, shoes. In one corner, a gold-embroidered banner was proclaiming, "Super Christmas Promotion: Fifty Percent on Santa Claus Boots!"

Heiji turned on his heels and fled.

Eventually he descended to the 'you want we have' department store on the second basement. Here at last there were no bells – sung carols on the radio, which wasn't much better, but at least you could recognise the songs. He skirted between the shelves and between the irritated gift-shoppers (plus the obaasans, plus the little kids, et cetera), in search of something both available and fitting, and possibly, not as ugly as _that_. He pushed the thing – whatever it was, a pair of socks? but what were the bobbles for, then? – back onto the display from whence it'd come and scowled at the loudspeaker above his head. 'The Twelve Days Of Christmas' was on, by John Denver and the Muppets. Ugh.

_For the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… a partridge in a pear tree._

Partridge and pears – hell, no, that might not have exactly the desired effect – at least not after the unfortunate remarks he'd been clever enough to make about her weight lately. Oh, and she'd made a fuss over it, when everybody know one fattens a bit during winter – chocolate and toffee, and she was particularly fond of both.

What an Ahou.

_For the second day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… two turtledoves/and a partridge in a pear tree._

Drama movies section. Titanic. That could be right – she really fancied this romantic stuff (though not as much as Neechan did, poor, poor Kudo. She was certain to receive one for Christmas – and he was certain to get an evening boring to death.)

Yes, that was the snag – Kazuha was more than able to bully him into watching it with her, especially if _he_ offered it to her.

What an Ahou.

_For the third day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… three French hens/two turtledoves/and a partridge in a pear tree._

That fancy red dress – well, maybe not. The neck was much too low, for one thing. Not that she had really much to fill it anyway. For another, what with his last ungracious remarks weight recently, she wouldn't appreciate his asking for her measurements, even over the phone. (_That_ would only cause him eardrum damage, and no Christmas present from that part.) And if he chose the dress a size too small, she'd look like a big red hen.

The Ahou. She just _had_ to make things more complicated for him.

_For the fourth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… four calling birds/three French hens/two turtledoves/and a partridge in a pear tree._

Birds and beasts – the pet store. Well, why not? Kazuha had always wanted a pet. A puppy was out of the question – it would grow up and – you know – pee everywhere, and her _mother_ would be pissed… which he would liked very much to avoid. But a cat… she had always loved cats… somehow she must have cat's genes, what with her eyes. Or a bird – a parrot, to whom she would teach to speak…

… on reflection…

Oh, the hell with it! What an Ahou…

_For the fifth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… five golden rings/four calling birds/three French hens/two turtledoves/and a partridge in a pear tree._

The jewellery shelves. There could be nice things for a girl in here – those rings, for instance. They were real gold, said the notice, and only half-price – because, of course, it was the lot of it the advertisers wanted to sell, not only one. And it worked, too – there were only two sets left. But then – he thought – Kazuha had never been fond of jewellery… just when he thought he'd come across something that might please her.

Yep. Still an Ahou.

_For the sixth day of Christmas, my true love gave to… six geese a-laying/five golden rings/four calling birds/three French hens/two turtledoves/and a partridge in a pear tree._

All right, he would risk – _risk_ – himself in the woman's department that is linen room. After all, he could always pass for some brother or boyfriend going shopping for his sister/girlfriend, couldn't he?

…

Wrong idea.

Just how many of them were there in here? How many women were packed in that small place? How had they succeeded in cramming them all within those four walls? And how – how the _hell_ – could they all talk so damn loud? It was like standing in the middle of a farmyard. All of them quacking like geese.

At least his Ahou didn't do that.

_For the seventh day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… seven swans a-swimming/six geese a-laying/five golden rings/four calling rings/three French hens/two turtledoves/and a partridge in a pear tree._

The stuffed toys department. Big promotion on swans. (Not much of a link with Christmas, though.) Well, Kazuha had never been very keen on cuddly toys – she used to eat them when she was little. Like, really, eat them. She had sharp teeth when two. His arm had never the same after… well, never mind.

An Ahou, then and now.

_For the eight day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… eight maids a-milking/seven swans a-swimming/six geese a-laying/five golden rings/four calling birds/three French hens/two turtledoves/and a partridge in a pear tree._

And what about those romantic books she used to love reading? You know, the kind with the-rich-heiress-the poor-manservant or vice-versa, who all ended up living happily ever after in spite of their personal issues. There were always half a dozen maids in those novels, either beheaded in a cellar or waiting for their charming price to come… Kazuha used to read them aloud to him.

No. Definitely not.

You know the phrase: Ahou one day…

_For the ninth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… nine ladies a-dancing/eight maids a-milking/seven swans a-swimming/six geese a-laying/five golden rings/four calling birds/three French hens/two turtledoves/and a partridge in a pear tree._

Musical comedies and operas. It's a Wonderful Life, Cinderella, Romeo and Juliet, West Side Story, Swan Lake… how did those guys classify these… hell, here too the story was always the same – girls dancing all over the place, yearning for lovers, singing their desperation to the moon and hoping it'd answer, which is, all in all, rather a silly expectation…

_For the tenth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… ten lords a-leaping/nine ladies a-dancing/eight maids a-milking/seven swans a-swimming/six geese a-laying/five golden rings/four calling birds/three French hens/ two turtledoves/and a partridge in a pear tree._

… and then said lovers coming in at the precise moment the damsels in distress, who were traditionally locked up during the day by villainous villains (can't blame them, poor guys), or turned into sheep or stuff, exited the scene, and began singing to the sun but-who-was-that-beautiful-girl-I-met-the-other-day-and-I-can't-forget-her oh hell no.

Even _she_ wasn't such an Ahou.

_For the eleventh day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… eleven pipers piping/ __nine ladies a-dancing/eight maids a-milking/seven swans a-swimming/six geese a-laying/five golden rings/four calling birds/three French hens/two turtledoves/and a partridge in a pear tree._

Music. Liked music. Heiji's brain was just too tired to make complete sentences, see. Well, that could be interesting – iiiiffff… he only knew what to get her. Too expensive. Too boring. Too rhythmic. Too slow. Too… not Kazuha-like.

Too not-Ahou-like.

_For the twelfth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me… twelve drummers drumming/__ eleven pipers piping/ nine ladies a-dancing/eight maids a-milking/seven swans a-swimming/six geese a-laying/five golden rings/four calling birds/three French hens/two turtledoves/and a partridge in a pear tree._

Music instruments. Oh, yeah. Guitars and stuff. Heiji's legs were very likely to fail him soon, all right, but he wouldn't be crazy enough to buy her such a thing as a double bass, or a tambourine, or drums…

… the AHOU was loud enough in normal times.

_For the twelfth day of Christmas, _bawled John Denver and the Muppets, _my true love gave to me…_

Wait. Stop.

Love?

-

On Christmas day, Kazuha was surprised when Heiji showed up without any parcel. He _never_ forgot her presents, neither at Christmas nor on her birthday. _Never._ But now, his hands were strikingly, and most obviously, empty.

"Looking for something?" he asked, with a nasty grin that would have sent normal people climb up curtains. Kazuha being Kazuha, she hid her own gift for him behind her back and stuck out her tongue.

"Ahou! Why would I stare? Why would I wonder why you don't have any present here?"

His grin widened as he bent a little towards her. "Who said I didn't have any present?"

"AHOU! Where could you have stuck it? In your–"

Fortunately, Kazuha's next words were bitten back in her throat as Heiji's mouth crashed unexpectedly against hers, making all her grumpiness melt away like water. He had strong, hard lips, and they tasted like something bitter, like tea when sugar's absent…

"… _that_'s my present, ahou," he said, pulling back, and then walked on to the living-room, whistling softly for himself. Kazuha stood dumbfounded. For a moment she thought she was dreaming. For a moment… and then…

"HEY! Who're you calling an ahou, you jerk!"

Definitely not dreaming.

-

**Definitely fluff, as promised. Rather fun to write – hard, though, to find items corresponding to the song, so sometimes I had to improvise. I hope it works anyway. Be sure to let me know.**

**See you tomorrow for a Kid-fashion Christmas! 'Till then, merry (future) Christmas!**


	3. Fireworks In Winter

**Author's note: Kaito Kid enters the stage! … and, of course, that only results on a lot of trouble for Nakamori-keibu and his men. But the idea of a red-and-green-dressed Kid and a tinsel-trimmed Nakamori was just too temptful. **

**Theme #3: Fireworks**

**I'd say DC and MK own me, seeing what they've made of my life.**

**-**

**Fireworks In Winter**

**-**

There was an unspoken Lupin-Ganimard kind of deal implicitly accepted by Kaito Kid on one side, and Nakamori-keibu on the other (which, on that side, then extended to the whole lot of the Task Force and eventually to the rest of the world, intense at watching. However careless and mischievous Kid appeared (and he certainly was both), there was nevertheless schemes and rules to be followed during his heists; beginning with his First and Number One Rule, No One Gets Hurt. Kid was immovable upon that point: he would not let anyone, whether innocent or not, whether on his side or any other, get hurt if he could prevent it – or, for that matter, if Nakamori and his men could prevent it. They did entertain a peculiar relationship which the medias pleased themselves upon calling interdependence, but which both involved parties regarded as trust.

Other rules existed – the beforehand card of ironical politeness, announcing each theft which an impudence and a determined liking for silly and undecipherable riddles which left the experts to bang their heads against the walls of their labs, for instance. Also the clothing in white, the inevitable tag games, and the usual dialogue between Kid and Nakamori-keibu, which consisted in grins and sarcasm on one side, and loads of swearing on the other. Even Kid's affirmed fancy for impossible things had become average; his puzzle-like imagination was a basis for clown chases and moonlit masquerades – heists were complicated events to begin with, and he seemed to have set his mind in confusing things still more by walking in the air and stealing jewels without appearing to touch them and, in the end, tricking them all the way through.

Still, whatever fantasies he had brought up before, however imaginative he had previously proved to be, whatever universal laws he had liked to break, it had never been enough to compare to _that_.

No matter how many of those much-tried experts and scientists would try and tackle the subject, they would just _never_ understand how the hell Kid, in the thirty seconds the black-out had lasted, in succeeded in trimming the whole jewel room with golden and silver shimmering tinsels. Christmas decorations – lighting garlands and crowns of holly and Santa Claus enormous socks and Christmas candy – were hung everywhere around the walls and from the ceiling – something like thirty white doves were fluttering about the room – and right in the middle, just beside the jewel case, stood a grand, over-hanging trim tree, adorned with more silver tinsels and candles ad red-and-white candy sticks. Kid himself was perched on top of it, dressed not in his usual white tux but in red-and-green clothing, a great crimson bag heaved on his shoulder.

Kid-fashion-celebrated-Christmas. Nakamori-keibu twitched.

"KID!" he bellowed. "What have you DONE to that jewel?"

"Nakamori-keibu," the thief said reprovingly, making a small 'tsk, tsk'-ing noise. "Have you never heard that Christmas was a season for loving and forgiving one another? You shouldn't swear like that. You'll lose all credibility."

"The _bloody_ JEWEL, Kid!"

"Why, yes, I've taken it – what did you expect?" He exhibited a small round golden gem and turned it expertedly between his gloved fingers. The gem's facets sent rapid flashes and glimmers under the warm glow of the tree's candles. "Pretty" he acknowledged in an appreciative tone, tossing it easily in the air where it gleamed, a golden trail, and then catching it back. "Very pretty. Quite worth the while," he added, beaming, but Nakamori-keibu had decided to stop listening to his speeches.

"Get it _back!_" he yelled, and thirty policemen of the task force dashed forwards in a run for trim tree, half of them nearly expecting it to begin swaying to and fro or something similar.

It didn't. In fact the Christmas decorations very scarcely rustled against the branches while Kid was standing up, and, as easy on that uncertain balance as if the tree's top had been a really solid stone floor, started drawing stuffed toys and gold-and-silver balloons from his great, red bag and bombarded the very honest citizens they were. They, however, did keep their ground firmly, and went on forcing their way through, only to find themselves rewarded, once climbed the tall trim tree, with a flash of blinding light and a puff of – of course – red-and-green smoke, and a burst of fresh laughter, as Kid disappeared… again, and Nakamori-keibu began swearing at the top of his voice.

It appeared however that Kid had no intention to stop there. Things had barely begun to get slightly less confused inside the building that they began to look very confused indeed outside it.

Fireworks exploded above the buildings and the cheering crowd.

Ran and green and gold and silver, they rose high in the air with a sharp wheeze, then burst in a million dazzling sparkles, far into the black sky. There was an awed shout from the throng gathered in the avenue below, and a row of applause as others set out, casting their brilliance over the roofs then falling back in glimmers like a shower of light. Shimmering, they disappeared in others' constantly renewed brightness, illuminating the cold, dark night with their fading ripples. With no care at all for rhythm and direction, Kid sent them all live their ephemeral life in all the glory and the magnificence of it, to remain carved in the memory of every spectator of this sight – and therefore into eternity.

"LADIES AND GETLEMEN!" His voice rang out joyously, loud and clear in the cold air, and so vibrating with youth that the whole crowd held its breath like one only man, and the half-second silence that followed was deepest than anything experienced before during a Kid heist. "A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU ALL!"

The avenue exploded in applause and cheers.

Far into the madding crowd, Aoko stood quite still. All around her, people were shouting and hugging and crying and fainting, running to one another with incontrollable emotion on their lips, bit she couldn't bring herself to move. Her head was slightly tilted upwards, her lips half-parted and her eyes lifted to the black sky where the fireworks kept imploding over and over again, red and green and gold and silver. The was something absurd about that sight, in the whole point of fireworks in winter, and the stupid animation of the audience… but it reminded her of other fireworks that had been set in winter, illuminating words on the surface of a building, which she and she only had been able to understand.

She smiled. It seemed that Kid and Kaito owned many common points…

"Aoko." Kaito had popped out of thin air, as he always did, with a rose and a grin.

"Hey," she greeted him with a smile. "I thought you couldn't come tonight?"

"I finished early." A shrug, as he offered her the rose, which she accepted gladly. "So?" He nodded over his shoulder at the fireworks wheezing high in the sky. "What do you think? Is Kid over-imaginative again?"

"Well, he does have a bit too much of Christmas spirit for my father to bear it," she said thoughtfully. "Still – it _is_ beautiful, after all." Catching an odd look from him, she added rapidly, "Don't mistake me here. I still hate him. I just admire his talent for annoying everyone."

"I know you'd say that," her best friend sighed – adding under his breath, "wouldn't look like you not to. Well–" (flinging his arms behind his head) "–what's next? Anything you want to do tonight? Dinner somewhere or something?"

"I haven't finished with Christmas decorations at my house." He cocked an eyebrow, obviously at a loss. It was Aoko's turn to grin. "Kid had at least the merit to remind me of that. Therefore, if you'd be so kind as to come over and help me with them, we could order a pizza – bake cookies–"

"Cookies!" Everything that was childishness in Kaito immediately surged up. "That's called bribing, Aoko – but I'm into it anyway. Come on!" He grabbed her hand, "Let's go!" and dragged her along in the throng, chuckling for some reason of his own. Aoko allowed herself a last look at the never-ending fireworks and followed – and together they ran towards a trim tree, Christmas decorations and – hopefully – a whole plateful of cookies.

-

Somewhere on a rooftop far above their heads, an old man better known as the owner of a billiard club was setting fire to a few more sticks planted in empty cans and, shaking his head, was thinking, "Little master, you will be the death of me. Even your late father wouldn't have hazarded–"

But it was undeniable that Kuroba Kaito, a.k.a the infamous Kaito Kid, was at no loss in what concerned Christmas spirit.

-

**Here's the first Aoko/Kaito! I know, they're not really a couple in here – not as much fluff as I promised you. But there'll probably be a sequel to this sometime along the way – and there, I swear, will be fluff enough to make your brain explode. Thou have been warned.**

**Merry (however future) Christmas!**


	4. Tickling Reindeers

**Author's note: I'm hard on poor Heiji. And it's rare I feature Kazuha as his girlfriend already (but everybody knows they're going to end that way anyhow, so hell, what's the point).**

**Theme #8: Reindeers**

**I still don't own anything. It didn't change since yesterday.**

**-**

**Tickling reindeers**

**-**

Kazuha stared. Kazuha snickered. Kazuha giggled.

By the time she began to laugh in earnest, Heiji had had more than enough. He dragged her inside, slammed the door and pinned her down against it, glaring. Which, seeing that he was dressed in a very old-fashioned, hand-knitted pullover, where red reindeers earnestly pursued one another on a background of white, creamy wool, wasn't actually efficient. No matter how hard she tried, Kazuha couldn't check her laughter – she had no grudge whatsoever against stag-decorated hand-knitted pullovers, but, really, seeing one on Heiji…

"Oh, quit it already," he growled, and then silenced her the best way he could think of. Kazuha, as she demonstrated by kissing back just as fully, certainly didn't mind… especially since, in the two months of their brand-new relationship, they had grown rather experienced in the matter of kisses.

"Do that somewhere else than on our doormat, you two. Bedrooms aren't for dogs," said a passing Shizuka. Heiji glowered after her mother, but Kazuha just laughed. Their respective parents, it seemed, had taken for granted since they were both in their cradles that they should end up together one day, no matter what excuses they could put up, and the information that the two stubborn kids had finally come to realize what they should always have known had not surprised them in the least.

Once in safety in Heiji's room, guarded from further sarcasm, Kazuha went on mercilessly, "Now, seriously, Heiji, what is _that_?" _That_ was presently being pointed at by a meaningful finger. Heiji scowled down at the reindeers, which paid no attention at him and went on chasing one another on an eternal background of creamy wool.

"_That_," he said, "is a present from my grandmother. She was here until a few minutes ago – in fact, she left just before you arrived. You probably met her somewhere on the way." Kazuha did remember having stridden by an old obaasan in the street, but it was dark outside already and she'd barely been struck by a vague resemblance. "And she was really proud of her knitted masterpiece, so she really wanted me to put it on and I didn't have time to take it off before you c– and _stop _giggling!"

"Sorry." Kazuha coughed, quickly recovering herself. She couldn't help staring, though – once gotten over the initial shock, this pullover wasn't so bad. In fact, Heiji did look quite old-fashioned in this, but he also was – cute. She didn't think that often about him. Handsome yes, charismatic even, when it came to detecting cases and tracking murderers and turning his cap the other way round – but rarely cute. It was a nice change. Due to Christmas hovering in the air, no doubt – if Heiji came to wearing such clothes, virtually anything could happen.

"_Quit_ the staring, Kazuha." She loved hearing him say her name, too; even if usually they still referred to one another as the Ahou. (Even Christmas couldn't change that.) So when he did call her by her name, she loved everything about it – the way the words rolled on his tongue and how sensual he succeeded in making it sound. Like he was actually kissing her – or very much asking for it–

"Oi! Ahou! _Stop_ staring, will you?"

Kazuha snapped back in focus, and, once registered the situation, "You're the ahou! What's with the idea of walking about wearing such outfits, too! Couldn't you just toss it aside after your grandmamma had gone? Ahou!"

One eyebrow was arched. "Oh?" And with this he set about taking off the pullover, under which, so she hurriedly came to understand, he was wearing nothing at all.

Hormones went mad. "Gah! Don'tdoitnowdon'tdoitnow!" she shrieked – even after two months of dating they hadn't gone as far as getting so much accustomed with each other's body.

"Oh." The eyebrow was descended, the pullover tucked back down and the Smirk back at it again. His arms encircled her waist from behind, since she had turned from him in complete and irresolute dismay, and his chin rested on the top of her head. "What _exactly_ do you want, Ka-zu-ha?" his warm voice asked playfully in her ear.

"Ahou," she grumbled listlessly, and then tilted her head to the side so that he could plant soft kisses in her neck. She felt his lips curl into small smiles as her body deeply relaxed against his; he then tightened his hold, pressing her back against his chest. The kisses went up to her ear and down her jawline, deliciously lingering and featherlike, attacking her tingling skin with their lightness and the caresses of his breath. For the thousandth time – like every time since he had first kisses her, she wondered how he could always arise those sensations deep in her belly – how he could always find the one sensitive spot which made her shudder in his arms – how he had come to know her so well, to know exactly what to trigger at what moment and how to trigger it.

At length she whirled around in his arms and kissed him by surprise – well, no, maybe not. It was evidently what he had tended to all that time, and seeing how eager he was to kiss fully back and take control, he had probably anticipated everyone of her moves.

The kiss was warm and lasted long. When they let go, they were both gasping for air. Then Heiji leant his forehead against his girlfriend's, and, in one of those fits of tenderness Kazuha always delighted in, murmured, "Merry Christmas, 'Zuha."

"Merry Christmas to you too," she murmured back, still breathless, and then broke free of the embrace, laughing. She gave his lips a rapid peck, but her attention was then drawn to the reindeers, who went on their endless chase on their starlight background. "I wonder…" she whispered, "I wonder if those stags are ticklish."

"What? No!" Heiji protested, but too late already. A spasm of laughter agitated him as Kazuha's expert fingers rapidly tickled at his ribs, and for a few moments he staggered on his feet, ready to fall over, until he recovered enough to push Kazuha away, flap her onto his bed, and tickle back. Her laughs rose as well, fresh and clear, making him want to… hear it more. And tickle on.

Thus, the Great Tickling Reindeers Battle began. On the bed. Quite confusedly. (And no, they were NOT making out, you perverts!)

After the last minutes of downright chaos, things calmed down a little bit. They were both lying on the bed (fully dressed, thank you), panting a little and still crossed with rapid, irresistible laughs. Slowly, with long, deep breaths being taken, their hearts eased down from frantic pounding to profound beating, and they eventually snuggled against each other, laughing still.

"God," Heiji said, "where d'you get those ideas…"

Kazuha nuzzled against his shoulder. "I'm probably one of the only people on Earth who actually know you're ticklish, Heiji." She closed her eyes; she was wild-haired, cheeks slightly flushed, and, in Heiji's mind, adorable. He wouldn't tell her that – he so rarely complimented her she would probably punch him on the arm, thinking he was mocking. He hardly ever told her she was beautiful… though she was, undoubtedly. He touched her hair with a kiss she would never feel.

"I love you," he said. Now, at least, he could say it without denying anything, but it was still rare enough. Proof of that was Kazuha's surprised glance at his face before she broke into a smile.

"I love you, too." There was a warmth in her voice even she rarely bestowed to him. It was the depth of a heart madly in love for years, and which had finally obtained what it was yearning for – the happiness of these situations, despite everything that hadn't changed – 'ahou'ing, quarrelling, shouting an so on, which made those peculiar moments of closeness and peace more intimate than anything.

They shared another rapid kiss and settled back to their embrace, feeling content with themselves and satisfied with the world in general. Heiji's room was well and warmly lit, and there was nothing more comfortable than the deep nest of pillows and covers they were lying on – nothing more agreeable than their close embrace and the soft sound of each other's slow breathing.

A soft knocking at the door. "Heiji, will Kazuha eat here tonight?"

"Yes, she will," Heiji called out, without consulting her. Kazuha scowled up at him.

"You could've asked me."

"Don't be silly," he said, with what could have been a pout and what could have been an ill-disguised smirk. "And lie back. You're warm." He languidly wrapped back his arms around her shoulders and waist, enclosing her possessively against his chest.

"What am I, a heater," she grumbled for form's sake, and lay back. Her hair spread, tickling his face. Her cheek was grazing against the woollen fabric of his pullover – red stags against white sky and ground, endlessly chasing one another, motionless and yet in motion, patterned together by a grandmother's tender knitting. The contact was soft and deliciously fuzzy; it tickled her cheek and nose. Maybe hand-knitted pullovers weren't that bad, after all…

They probably fell asleep.

**-**

**I own one or two of those hand-knitted pullovers, coming from my Swedish grandmother. I found them in the back of a shelf the other day, and it kinda inspired me for that fic.**

**Some maths now:**

**Given that Kazuha wonders for the thousandth time how Heiji can make her feel, etc, etc,**

**Given that she admits having wondered this every time he kissed her since their very first,**

**Given the length of their relationship so far (two months),**

**Given the date (17****th**** of December),**

**Given that there are 31 days in October and 30 in November,**

**Calculate how many times they kissed since the beginning of their relationship.**

**And, for those who're still with us, admitting that those two are able to see each other about twelve hours a day, determine the number of kisses per day and per hour that makes.**

**Heads up! Christmas vacation is drawing near.**


	5. Life Ain't Always Wonderful

**Author's note: If you American readers don't know my source of inspiration for that one, then it'll mean it's really old-fashioned… I watched the film three days ago and got the idea. 'Twas fun writing it.**

**Theme #6: Angel tricks**

**I don't own the cast. I don't own the idea. I don't even own the words (some kind of assembly does, or else it's people itself). In fact I own nothing (isn't that tragic…)**

**-**

**Life Ain't Always Wonderful**

**-**

Many of them had come and gone, pleading her to open up, but she would not yield.

All of them held more or less the same try-and-understand speech, though in different styles – her mother, worried and compassionate; her father, with his 'I told you to ditch him' talk; Megure-keibu, who'd said he understood perfectly but really didn't; Hakase, who'd tried to explain her 'how much Shinichi-kun had never meant this to happen,' but Ran refused to listen. Once Eri had come up, saying Hattori-kun and Kazuha-chan were on the phone and wanted to talk to her, but Ran hadn't as much as looked up.

Then Shinichi himself had turned up. His voice had risen through the wooden panel, tired, almost sad. He'd said her name first, softly, with an even voice, and it had sent shivers down Ran's spine, along with more tears spilling afresh from her eyes, gliding down her cheeks, dropping on her drawn-up knees, like a necklace of silver pearls.

"Ran…"

How _could_ he dare show up that way? Asking to talk to her, when she'd made it clear she despised him for all his lies. _I wanted to protect you. I wanted to keep you safe. I'm so sorry._ They were all, all empty words – he wanted her to trust him with them now, when all trust was bound to disappear, when she couldn't make out what was a lie and what wasn't.

"Ran, listen." More firmly. "Everyone's worrying for you. Please come out. You don't have to talk to me. You don't even have to look at me. Just come down. Please don't shut yourself up."

"No," Ran murmured. "Leave me alone."

"Ran, you can't stay in here forever…"

"Go _away…"_ Ran moaned. She hid her face in her knees and closed her eyes tight, but his voice still reached her, pleading. "Ran…" She didn't want to hear him anymore – for every word he would, could utter, would appear like nothing but a lie. It was awful… it was awful, not being able to believe the only words that could heal her wounds, the only words which she yearned to listen to and trust. Tears flowed in more heavily, never, it seemed, to dry away.

Eventually Shinichi must have given up, for he fell silent, and probably walked away, though she didn't hear him leave. She found herself all alone in the silence she'd created, only broken by her hiccups. Downstairs, she figured, they were probably all gathered up in the office, discussing her stubbornness and seeking the best way to tackle her. She didn't want to hear them, their useless words – they wished to comfort her, when she didn't want to be comforted…

She let sadness and betrayal swell inside her like mockingbirds, reminding her mercilessly of everything she wanted to forget, preventing her from drifting off in sweet, senseless sleep…

"I wish I'd ever been born," she murmured, "and could never have known all this."

"You shouldn't make such wishes, you know," a mirthful voice said from _inside_ the room. "There's always the risk that they should be granted.

Ran's head snapped up, with the crazy idea, for a fleeting second, that Shinichi had worked his way inside – the voice had sounded strangely alike his own. Instead, she found herself faced with an angel sitting cross-legged on top of her wardrobe.

At first sight, it was the typical angel – androgyny face, rather bony somehow, long immaculate cloth, shining halo above a flash of golden curls, white-feathered wings curling around him/her/it. Him, Ran thought. In lack of a more proper approximation.

At second sight, things were slightly different. As far as Ran's angel-related culture extended, she had never heard of any one wearing trainers, or an actually _blinking_ halo. His clothes weren't a long angelic tunic, but a simple shirt and jeans – both extremely white though (washed and pressed by some heavenly laundry, no doubt). In fact, paradoxically, only the wings looked well-placed and actually real – the feathers were a bit messy, as if he'd flown a good deal tonight…

Ran blinked. Hallucinations now.

"Ah – er – who–?" was her very intelligent question. The angel – or _whatever­_ it was – arched an eyebrow and grinned.

"You're in worse state than I thought." Now, his voice didn't quite sound like Shinichi's – there was something like his arrogant tones in it, but there also existed accents of irony and carelessness which didn't quite fit. "Isn't it obvious?" He uncurled his wings and fluttered them at her. A short gush of wind flapped against Ran's face. "Or do I have to be more explicit? I mean, wings, halo, curls," shaking them, "if you need any more references I really don't know what to do."

"… sure," Ran murmured, slipping off her bed and backing toward the door. "Angels. And… what are you here for?"

"You made a wish," the – ah – angel said, putting on a grim face. Ran felt behind her, searching for the door's handle. Outside was probably Shinichi, she thought, and her heart sank.

"A wish?" she repeated, cautiously.

"Yes, you know," he waved in the air, and his wings fluttered again (air-conditioner-integrated. Great.) "The whole 'I wish I'd never been born' stuff. You'd be surprised how many people wish for that, specially at Christmas. Last year there was a man who…"

"Never mind that." She grasped at the knob, feeling that, given the whole situation, she was rather calm. "Do you mean to say that you've come here to…"

"–grant you your wish, yes," the angel said, impatiently. "I'd rather be spared the task, mind you – but there are rather powerful entities up there," (a dark look at the ceiling), "who are really interested in the matter of you and that boyfriend of yours. So here I came, under general request…" And, with this, he simply disappeared in thin air – without so much as a _pop._

Blink blink.

No change. "All right," Ran sighed, letting go of the knob and raising her hand to pinch her arm. "If I've gone so far as to have hallucinations, my case must be pretty hopeless by now," and found herself in the middle of an over-crowded avenue.

The change was sudden, silent, and completely unexpected. One moment she had been standing in her room, thinking she had gone mad or something – and the other she was in that Tokyo boulevard at night, and someone had just bumped into her. And if she needed any further verification that she _had_ gone mad, that was it.

The first shock – _physical_ shock – was the cold. It was _freezing_, and, as she then remarked, she was wearing the same light clothes she'd had on a minute ago. The second shock was the suddenness of the noise – cars roaring by, horns wheezing, footsteps slamming and people bawling to be heard above, and adding to, the racket. The third was the actual realization of what was happening.

Ran didn't care to think any further. She recognised the time, she recognised the street – Sonoko. Sonoko didn't live far off. Sonoko could provide her with warmer clothes. Sonoko, maybe, could help her figure out the teleportation-effect she'd just experienced.

She ran.

The throng was dense, and, of course, going downstream, so running up the avenue proved out to be longer and more exhausting than she'd thought. Breathless, she stepped onto the Suzukis' porch and banged hurriedly against the door. It was beginning to snow, and she was shivering.

A maid – Gladys – opened to her. She knew her well – she'd been there seven years and had always been of the sympathetic, smiling type of woman.

Only not now.

She was _measuring_ her. "Miss?" she said in a pompous tone Ran didn't know to her. "Whom do you wish to see? Who must I introduce?" Her gaze swept critically on Ran's light, messy clothes and wild hair, due to the running.

"It's me, Gladys-san," Ran panted, sill breathless. "Is Sonoko here?"

Gladys pursued her lips. "Sonoko-san _is_ there. What do you want to tell her about?" Her tone was definite coldness. Ran's eyes widened slightly, but she'd had no time to answer that a well-known voice called out from the inside of the house,

"Who is it? Gladys, close the door. There is a draught."

"Sonoko! Good, you're there," Ran exclaimed, relieved, now expecting Gladys to step aside and let her in. She did step aside. Sonoko replaced her, Ran's words strangled in her throat as she stared, aghast, at her old friend – who was gazing back with something like… scorn.

Okay, something to be said about Suzuki Sonoko. She was rich. She was proud. Her nasty grins were extremely irritating. She did care a lot about her appearance – discolouring her hair, going to the manicure every week, but she had never looked like… this.

There wasn't a spot of skin on her face that wasn't covered in a make-up – the whole lot, foundation, mascara, eyeliner, lipstick, blood-red three-inches-long nails. As for her clothes – or lack thereof… well, the usual Sonoko may be fond of mini-tops and mini-skirts, but even she wouldn't have worn such a… thing.

"_Yes_?" she said, and there was definitely a disdainful inflexion to her voice. "What do you want?" She talked like she was dressed – outrageously. Her eyes considered as coldly as Gladys' had Ran's ruffled clothes, messy hair and flushed cheeks, the lack of make-up and the traces of tears more than obvious.

Ran was aghast, but she tried. "Sonoko, I..."

A depilated eyebrow was raised. "And _who_ exactly are you?" Sonoko's painted face expressed as much scorn as it could under the foundation. "Have we met?" she asked, in a voice that evidently said, 'You're not worth remembering.' "Do you need anything?" in one that meant, 'You won't get anything anyway, so shoo.'

Ran was too astonished to answer. The other eyebrow was arched, then, very expressively, the door was slammed.

Ran cursed out loud.

"Well, it's what you want, you know," an unfortunately familiar voice said lightly – Ran swirled around. The angel was sitting on the parapet or the Suzuki's porch, a fugitive smirk curling his pale lips. He was wearing a Santa Claus bonnet. "It's what you asked for, isn't it?"

"You!" Ran said, furiously. "It was you who – who did–" she gestured at the door. The angel looked at it interestedly.

"You see," he said, "without you to canalize her, Suzuki Sonoko has become the perfect slut." (Ran could but agree, but she wouldn't admit it.) "Without you as a best friend, she has found _other_ friends – and, obviously, not the best of the best. Without you…"

"But I'm _here_!" Ran exclaimed, gesturing this time at herself.

"Well, technically, no you're not." The angel beamed at her, as though not aware that he'd just told her she didn't – _technically_ – exist. "So what are you going to do now?" He fluttered his wings at her, and was gone.

What am I going to do, indeed? Ran thought, stepping down the flight of stairs that led to the porch. It was definitely snowing by now – and the throng, if possible, was denser. She had no idea what was going on – the accident with Sonoko – and yet it wasn't her – she was going to have a headache. It was something that might have happened in a dream, but this didn't feel like a dream. It felt terribly real. And she was freezing.

She zoned through the streets. They were all brilliantly illuminated with Christmas lights and garlands, and people were rushing about with bags and gift-wrapped presents, giving sometimes a surprised look at this light-dressed girl who appeared to be walking aimlessly. How strange, she thought. They were all belonging to a very strange world – or maybe she was the strangest.

Her footsteps took her to a small ensign, resting against a wall near the entry to a flight of steps, which said, 'Café Poirot.' Above was lining up large familiar letters, black against the brilliantly lit windows, Mouri Kogoro, Detective Agency. Relief filled her without any actual reason, and she ran up the stairs. The office door was ajar. She peeped inside.

The room was complete messiness. The floor and furniture, the same furniture she'd known all her life, were littered with ashtrays, cigarette ends and empty bottles of beer. In one corner, the TV was on – the results of today's horse races – and on her father's desk were piled up the usual mountains of papers, along with more ashtrays and bottles. A whole pack of cans stood at the feet of it. Chairs were thrown over, some broken – Ran absently, mechanically pulled one up. Her father wasn't anywhere. She crossed the room to switch off the TV–

"Oi, what're you doing here?" Her dad's familiar voice, only curiously heavy and disconnected. Still, it was really him, looking like he usually did – but his hair was ruffled, she noted, his clothes messy and stained. His tie was knotted around his head, and his face… god, even during his worse moments she'd never seen it so. he had obviously not shaved for at least four or five days. There were rings under his eyes and his cheeks were hollow – he looked physically and mentally strained. It was… awful.

"Who are you? What do you want here?" he went on with the same voice heavy with alcohol, and Ran's heart fell.

"Don't you recognise me?" she asked, suddenly shuddering.

He burped. He was holding a bottle of beer, she remarked with watering eyes. "Should I?"

I'm afraid Ran somehow lost her temper at the point. Before she actually knew it, she'd strode through the office, tears gushing out of her eyes, and was exclaiming, sobbing, "But it's _me!_" How can you not recognise me? We've been living here together since Mom left! I'm Ran, I'm your daughter…"

She had barely finished the word that an iron grip closed around her wrist, drawing a cry of pain from her. Her – dad's eyes, a moment before drunken and inexpressive, where flashing with anger inches away from her face. "How pathetic," he spat, "to be making dirty jokes about this."

"Dirty jokes? I–"

He snapped at her in mid-sentence. "Everybody in the neighbourhood knows we've lost our little Ran when she was two! Do you have to remind me every _damn_ hour?" He let her go; she stumbled backwards, looking up with terrified eyes at him. "Now you go to hell!" She couldn't utter a sound as he shoved her outside the office and slammed the door behind. Ran was left with sliding to the hard floor of the stairs' landing and staring unbelievingly at the wooden panel.

"You see how he lets himself go," the angel remarked from two steps above. He was sitting with his elbows resting on his knees and his chin on his hands, "without you around." Ran looked emptily at him. She was too shocked to shout or even to be angry at him.

"Was that – was that–"

"Real? Oh, yes, it was real," the angel said. "Nothing less than real. Mouri Ran died when two. Her parents divorced two years later, and Mouri Kogoro became this cheap detective, who earns just enough to go on drinking and smocking. And betting on horse races."

Tears were rolling down Ran's face. "Why did you do this?" she murmured. The angel deadpanned her with a cold stare.

"You asked for it. Oh, of course," a shrug here, "it's not exactly like you'd never been born, but the result is the same. You have to understand," he continued seriously, "that Mouri Ran no longer exists in that universe. Some things have been changed by that, some others have not. Some people are different, some others–"

"... have not," Ran said, with the sudden vision of a house where she knew she would always be welcome. There lived a man who'd always been something of a grandfather to her, and he would shelter her if she asked for it, know her or not. To him she could tell her whole story, and, maybe, if he believed her (but, being an inventor, he believed in many things), he could help her make her way back.

-

Agasa-hakase welcomed her, not with the usual paternal hug he always bestowed her, but with cordial, friendly composure. Ran had hoped against hope that, at least, a sparkle of recognition would crush his face – Sonoko may have been faking, and her father had been drunk – and therefore her heart sank lower still when he looked down smilingly at the young stranger girl standing in a dishevelled state on his doormat.

"Hakase, I – don't you – don't–" she stammered, hesitating as to go inside as freely as she used to do, finding no words to express her distraught feelings.

"What do you want, my dear girl?" His frozen, yet agreeable smile was unbearable.

"Don't you recognise me?" she finished lamely. She saw puzzlement settle on his features – her throat tightened, because she already knew the answer, already knowing that he did not, would not recognise her, that this Agasa-hakase had never known Mouri Ran.

"Have we met before I'm sorry, I do not recall–"

Something snapped again deep in Ran's chest. Suddenly she was dashing forwards and shouting, "But _how_? how can you not recognise me? How can you not know me? It's me, Ran! I've known you since I was a child! Shinichi and I used to come and play at your place and watch your inventions crash – Shinichi…" She blurted out that name, eyes widening in shock and realization. "Shinichi…"

She looked up to stare into a mask of glass. She gulped – such a cold, icy look was not usual in Hakase's face. Her words strangled in her throat.

"I see," he said dryly, and it was like a stalactite stabbing her in the chest, hearing him gaze down at her with so much disdain. "Well, you had much better go back to whatever club you're from. Poor Shinichi-kun's really drawn-out, you know – he doesn't need hysterical fangirls to come up and make a row."

And, for the third time in the evening, a door was slammed in Ran's face.

She staggered back into the street, bewildered. She felt – empty, disorientated, frightened, disgusted – strange. She wanted this nightmare to stop. She wanted to go back to her world – to a world where Sonoko wasn't a vamp, her father not a drunker (well, not that much) and Hakase didn't look down to her…

"Seems that your third attempt has failed, too," the angel remarked softly. He was now sitting on top of a streetlamp, legs dangling in the light, beaming down at her. Ran leant her back against the iron post, breathing heavily.

"Make me go back," she pleaded. "Let them know me again."

"Oh, no," the angel said. "Not yet. You still have to visit someone. There's someone you haven't seen yet." And with a nod towards the house neighbouring Hakase, he disappeared again.

The light fell on Ran, hard, within the surrounding darkness. There was so sound and no other light at miles around but her disgorged breathing and that blinking light from the streetlamp. Rubbing her arms, she stared at the house – the black, heavy, unchanged house. The ten thousand thoughts she had been trying to close up in a corner broke free and roamed through her mind, telling her what she had known all along and pretended to ignore. Saying that everything she had lived through tonight had lead her to that house, to staring at it through a veil of falling darkness, and seeing it all revolve around it.

Simple answers. It was only difficult to see them through.

The gate wasn't closed, only pushed. She walked up the alley, gravel creaking under her feet, the heart throbbing hard in her chest as she approached the porch, the well-known door, preventing her from breathing properly. On the doorframe used to show marks she and Shinichi had made when children, measuring their height. Now there were the marks of only one child.

She rang the bell, once again in a struggle against hope – stressing the same words over and over again, _Please recognise me, please recognise me, please recognise me…_

"Coming!" his familiar voice called out from inside, and then footsteps slammer near.

_Please, please, please recognise me…_

He opened the door. Ran's heart broke.

"Yes?" His painfully blue eyes scanning her face quizzically, taking in her reddened cheeks and silently parted lips. He was as polite and distant as a stranger to a stranger. Ran's heart was falling, falling far inside her. "Do you want anything?" He was the same, exactly the same – face, hair, voice were excruciatingly close and familiar, and here was the stab again, the anger against his betrayal, the pain caused by all his lies…

"You don't recognise me, do you?" she asked, her lips curling in a self-contemptous snarl because she already knew the answer.

"No." Blunt, harsh. I don't know you. I never met you. And this glint of suspicion in his eyes – he probably thought she was a fangirl, too – how ironical. "Do you need anything in particular?" he repeated, closing the door an inch.

"No – I – yes." She had no idea what she would say next, but she wouldn't stand having his door slammed in her face. Anybody else's – but not his. Not him.

"Listen, I really don't have time for this," Shinichi said coldly. "You should go back home now," and went to close the door. Ran felt a sensation surge up so powerful she almost didn't recognise it, and her legs suddenly failed as her tears began to glide down her cheeks, inexorably.

The next minutes were confused. In a blur, he saw Shinichi re-open the door hastily, and catch her elbow to stabilize her. She vaguely remembered moving, the walls of the hall flashing by, her heart thumping hard against her ribcage, tears flowing down her face, and his strong arm around her back, supporting her. Next thing she really consciously knew, she was standing in the middle of his living-room, wrapped up in a blanket, and Shinichi was placing a cup of hot tea within her hands.

"Sit down," he said. She sat.

"Drink." She drank. The tea was bitter – only one lump of sugar, just as she liked it. But he couldn't know that.

"Now," he sat on the vouch beside her and leant forwards on his elbows, looking detective-like. "Tell me what the matter is." Ran looked up at him, at his frowning, concentrated face, then back at her tea, whose brown-grey surface was softly rippled by her breath, and told him what the matter was.

-

The clock had only struck the hour once since she had begun her story. Now the empty cup was laid down on the coffee table, and Shinichi was standing at the window, looking out into the night. Ran tightened the blanket's folds around her, dreading cold – here, at least, she felt warm, she felt safe and calm.

"I understand you mustn't believe me?" she said softly, staring at the well-known coffee table.

"It's not that I don't believe you," he said. He had remained silent all the while she'd been talking, from the angel appearing in her room to her friends and relatives not knowing her; without asking a single question, and his voice croaked a little. He scraped his throat and went on, "I have to understand everything. Who are the friends you went to see first?"

"My… best friend," Ran said, with fleeing sorrow. "Her name Suzuki Sonoko. She…"

"Suzuki?" she looked up; his expression was unreadable. "Yes. Do you know her?" she asked curiously;

He hesitated. "More or less," he answered briefly. "She's a classmate of mine. I've never been very close to her, but I know her enough to – I shouldn't have seen her as someone who might–" that hesitation again, "–like you."

The image of Sonoko, with those un-dressing clothes and contemptous snarl when she'd slammed the door in her face, flashed through in Ran's mind. "I know," she said bitterly. "The Sonoko I knew wasn't that kind of – she wasn't like that. She was often annoying, but she was a good friend. I should never have imagined as–" she shuddered.

"Who was next?" Shinichi asked softly. He had sat on the chair opposite the couch, folding his legs and hands. He was looking so exactly like the confident Shinichi she used to know it was almost reassuring.

"My father," she murmured, trying to keep an even voice and not to remember the anger there had been in his eyes when he'd told her she'd been dead for sixteen years. "His name's Mouri Kogoro. He's a detec–"

She stopped short. Shinichi's friendliness had suddenly vanished, and her glare onto her was as hard as ice. "I see," he said, more coldly than she'd ever imagined him. "So that's Occhan's new idea, isn't it – send me a spy with a fairy story."

"A _spy_?" Ran exclaimed outrageously. "How can you say such a thing?"

"Very easily," he said dryly. "Mouri Kogoro had been trying to outwit me for the last three years, and he had used every possible mean to get into the secrets of my so-called 'detective skills'. Too bad he doesn't have the brains to use my methods of investigation."

Hearing this hurt, even in this world – or dimension, or alternative, or whatever it was. But what hurt more was hearing him think so ill of her; seeing his disdain on his features and in his voice and knowing from now on he wouldn't believe her. "How can you say I'm a spy?" she murmured. "Do you think I'm enjoying being here? Do you think ii liked hearing my _father_ tell me I'd died of the age of two?" Tears rolled down her cheeks again, but his expression didn't vary – he thinks it's an act, she thought desperately. "Do you think I fancied being door-slammed even by Hakase, although I've known him all my life, and–"

"Hakase?" Shinichi's expression was unreadable again. He was looking at her with a strange gleam in his blue eyes. "You say you've known him all your life?"

"Yes – in my world, yes," Ran was talking fast now, putting up speed with every word, "you and I use to go at his place and have fun with him – we drank coffee there for the first time, and he gave us all kind of weird items and we watched his crazy inventions which all ended up exploding–"

"Do you remember," Shinichi cut in (he stood up briskly and began pacing about the room), "do you remember that bunny thing he destined to toy stores and which was supposed to have a plate memory and talk with the kids–"

"–it eventually short-circuited its synapses when we weren't looking and we used to joke that it had preferred suicide to assuming such a task," Ran completed mechanically, and then gasped. Her hands covered her mouth. She stared.

"I guess that's evidence, then," Shinichi said gently. He was leaning on his armchair's back, his eyes fixed seriously onto her. "Only Hakase and I knew about that story in this world. Hakase was pissed off, and I buried the bunny–"

"–in the yard, below the tree," Ran whispered. Shinichi nodded, without so much as an apology, but something at his lips that looked almost like a smile. Ran felt, for the first time, that they were sharing something, common memories they were the only deposits of. It felt warm. It felt like belonging somewhere.

"All right," Shinichi resumed as tranquilly as if nothing had happened, "so what happened next? You saw the angel again, and he told you to go and visit me?"

"Not exactly," Ran said, frowning to remember. "I asked him to send me back… he said, no, I still had somebody to see, nodded towards your house, and then," she opened her hands, "disappeared."

"He appears to like this appearing/disappearing stuff a lot," Shinichi remarked, then his voice lapsed into silence. It lasted long. He was thinking, in that position Ran knew so well – knees drawn up, palm against palm as if to pray – breathing evenly, his eyes staring at nothing in particular. The clock was ticking slowly, steadily, adding to the peaceful atmosphere, and she could almost feel herself with Shinichi during one of those study evenings they used to be having before he'd been shrunk into Conan, before their lives had strayed away–

"It's probably none of my business to be asking this," he said hesitantly, looking up from his thoughts, but – if you don't mind answering – what made you wish you had never been born?" A short pause, too short for her to think of a reply, then he added rapidly, "Did it have anything to do with me? That is – the other me?"

Ran nodded curtly.

"Why?"

"I – you won't believe me." She was certain of that, at least – if you had doubted her about her own story, he wouldn't believe her on the Conan business. Many people, in her own world, had called it an easy story, and his logical, calculating mind would simply refuse it as even possible."

"I could believe many things now," he said, and there was a bitter note in his voice she couldn't really place. "Try me."

Ran told him.

She told him everything, everything she could think of – everything she knew about the Conan shrinking, the Black Organisation, the FBI's involvement, about Nemuri no Kogoro and Hattori Heiji and Kaito Kid, about her little brother and the Shounein Tantei, about Shinichi – Shinichi lying, disguising, protecting, Shinichi who had never told her, who hadn't trusted her, who'd wanted to protect her – ironically enough – by wounding her much, much more than anybody else could ever have done.

And Shinichi – the other Shinichi, the one who had no Mouri Ran to lie to – listened her through in almost absolute silence. Once or twice, towards the end, he interrupted her to question her about the names of the Organisation's members or the way the FBI had proceeded to infiltrate it. A rapid smirk flew on his lips at the evocation of Kaito Kid, and a frown twitched his brow when she told him Ai-chan's real name. When she had finished, he helped her again to some tea, and fell back into silence.

When he eventually spoke, his words were nothing like Ran could have expected.

"Well," he said, relaxing in his armchair, "at least now I'm sure you're saying the truth." He marked a pause, to smile at Ran's puzzled expression. With a slight hesitation, he added, "this… all that you've just talked about really happened in this world, too."

Ran gaped. Shinichi smiled gently and shoved the steaming cup of tea towards her. "It id," he insisted. "Only I sheltered at Hakase's, as did Haibara later on. Some details vary, of course – I don't know Hattori Heiji as well as the other me seems to, although I do know Kaito Kid," a soft chuckle at this, "–an I didn't meet the FBI under the same circumstances, but the main idea remains as a whole. And it all ended three weeks ago, just like it did here. Which is why I dread fangirls so much," he grinned.

Ran eyed him suspiciously. "And how does that convince you I'm saying the truth? I could have read this story in the papers and be making this up." (Mental gasp – she could have kicked herself.)

"No," Shinichi said excitedly, "because you have told me details which didn't appear in the papers – such as Gin and Vodka's names, for instance, or the Shounein Tantei, whom nobody knows about out of Teitan Primary School." He laughed, then checked himself at the sight of her grim face. "I'm sorry. I–"

The clock rang again, probably on purpose. Shinichi gazed hurriedly at it, then at the pitch-black window. "It's dark" he remarked uselessly. "You'd better settle in one of the guest rooms – there're quite a lot of them you know…" he stopped, and laughed again. "Yes, of course you know. I'll get you some of my mother's clothes while you drink your tea – tomorrow morning we'll go see Hakase again and we'll try and find a way." He looked excited. Exactly, Ran thought, like Conan-kun did when they collapsed with a new case. "Don't worry," he added with a smile a bit too all-knowing for her to like. "We'll send you back home, and exited the room.

This is how, less than one hour later, Ran was resting in one of the numerous bedrooms of the house (the precise one where she used to sleep when she stayed over, she had remarked with a smile) and was staring at the ceiling, thinking. She felt muddled up, as all threads of what had happened tonight tangled around her in her grand bed… or maybe it was just sleep taking over.

"_Well," the angel said, "have you thought it out?" He was sitting on complete nothingness, just standing out in the shadows. There was no light on and Ran couldn't discern anything two feet away, but she could detail every feather on his wings._

"_Yes," she said firmly. "I'll go back home."_

_The angel swirled his Santa Claus bonnet around his finger. He looked thoughtful. "You have a question to ask._

_Telepath or physiologist? Ran raised an eyebrow. "Yes. All this – this world… was it real? Did it all really happen?" She didn't know what exactly she expected by this. A no-it-was-a-dream answer wouldn't satisfy her – besides, she knew it had been nothing like a dream._

"_Well, yes, it's happened – it happens," the angel said, with a I-know-exactly-what-you're-thinking-of air. "It is happening. It is existing. It's just on a different track." He kept silent for a moment. "You saw how your disappearing affected it. Affected it differently from yours, I mean."_

"_Well, it didn't kill or save anybody, either," Ran retorted – she felt uncomfortable with the idea that her existence should have a real influence on somebody's life._

"_Well, no – not really," the angel said, with a kin of smile that obviously meant 'I know something you're not aware of and I'm not going to tell you'. Ran shrugged – she didn't wish to know. She couldn't help wondering though, if a life was to be changed with her own existence (or, rather, non-existence) whose it would be – Sonoko's, her father's, Shinichi's? or someone else's altogether?_

"_I will be back instantly?" she asked. The angel's smile did not falter._

"_Instantly."_

"_And no one will have noticed I'm gone."_

"_I cannot guarantee you that." His wry look softened a little. "You still have somebody you need to see, haven't you?" and disappeared in a Cheshire cat fashion. Ran looked around at the greyish darkness but he was nowhere to be seen. "Yes," she murmured._

… and she lay back on her bed, her father shaking her shoulders and shouting her name.

"_Ran! RAN!"_

"She's awake!" a voice she recognised to be Sonoko's called from above her head, and there were several cheers and sighs of relief from all around her room. Ran gave a moan of pain. She ha a terrible headache, and her lungs were squeezing under the deep breaths she was taking.

From her father's white face, her eyes passed on to her mother, whose fingers were digging in her husband's arm, to Sonoko, who was hovering over her and talking as fast s she could, to Hakase, sitting on a chair and looking as though he'd almost had a heart attack, to Ai-chan, whose childish face was pale, too, to Megure-keibu and immediately next to him, finally finding the one she'd sought all along, Shinichi. He looked shaken. His hands were grasping at her chair's back and in his blue eyes, immediately locking with hers, there was terror.

Time stilled in that blue.

Then it started up again, and the moment passed in everybody crying out in relief and dashing forwards to hug her. Gasping, Ran disentangled herself from the arms of a weeping Sonoko and stuttered, "wha… what happened?"

They all looked hesitantly at one another, shrugging and – it seemed – wondering too. At length it was her mother who responded, "Shinichi-kun was worried, dear – he didn't hear anymore. She looked expectantly at Shinichi, who gave a rapid nod. "So he forced the door open and he found you… you were not breathing anymore." (A great wail from her father.) "For a few moments, we… we though we had lost you. We thought you wouldn't come back." Her face discomposed at the thought.

"I have been a bad father!" Mouri Kogoro yelled. "Ran, it's me, it's all because of me… My daughter, my darling daughter…"

"Ran-chan, you should have yourself examined," Hakase's deep, worried voice came out. "We'll take you over to the clinic–"

"Raaan!" bawled Sonoko, covering even Kogoro's lamenting sobs. "Ran, I've been so afraid, so afraid…"

Ran was listening at neither. She was looking at Shinichi again, and had found him in a position she hadn't expected. He had slumped on the rotating chair he'd been clutching a moment ago, and propping his elbows on her desk, had his face in his hands. He was breathing fast, chest rising and falling rapidly. Grasped by such and such person who tried to make sure she was absolutely real, Ran couldn't drive her eyes away from her.

"Shinichi," she let escape in a trickle of voice, and the soft calm of her voice reduced all the racket to an entire held-back breath. All heads and gazes turned to him, and he started and looked at her, eyes wide blue. Ran stared back, the voice of the angel still ringing out in her head, saying, _you still have somebody you need to see, haven't you?_

"Ran…"

Eri beckoned him to come over, and he stood up and approached the bed with a puzzled expression, as though wondering when he should brace himself against her famous kick of doom. They all gazed at him as he sat on the bed beside her, some with compassion and encouragement, others (meaning, Kogoro) with a very dark glare. After a slight hesitation, Shinichi took her hand gently, intertwining their fingers.

"What happened, Ran?" he asked.

"you wouldn't believe me if I told you," she said, her voice firmer by the second. She was aware that everybody in the room was staring at them, including her own parents, but she couldn't tear her eyes away from his. That little – experience – had at least had the merit to change her point of view over the matter.

"I could believe many things now," he said, and didn't understand why she chuckled weakly. "Try me."

She told him.

-

**Aaaand… CUT!**

**Yep – cutting off the love scene. No death threats. I've written too much fluff over the last few days – and worse is to come, alas. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this little rewriting of 'It's a wonderful life'! A Merry Christmas to all of you!**


	6. Something Like Christmas Spirit

**Author's note: This fic was born from something in between angst, fluff, Christmas spirit and a determined dislike for sad endings. Why is this couple **_**always**_** asking for angst? Hm? Aoyama-sama, I'm blaming this all on you! For you are the real owner of Detective Conan and Magic Kaito! sigh.**

**Theme #4: Unexpected meeting**

**-**

**Something Like Christmas Spirit**

**-**

"_I think they're both just plain stupid," _a tiny voice said from the very depths of infinite outer space. "_I mean, they're madly in love with each other – they never acknowledged it but it's blindingly obvious. He tried to protect her. She grasped that, at least; but now they're supposed to be hating each other's guts. How long has it been now? Two months?"_

"_Maybe," _another thin voice answered, angrily, "_but that's really nothing of out business."_

Dearest readers, if you are really attentive tonight, and read those lines _very_ carefully, in the blue-and-silver-clouded sky I'm drawing over Christmas-tired Tokyo, you may see two small, shiny stars in the farthest southwest corner, blinking and sparkling through the night –and, if you are really imaginative, and look _real_ closely, you might remark that those stars' glimmers and twinkles actually corresponded to the words the two frail voices each spoke.

And then, if you're a bit logical, you will pay no attention to this, for, as everybody known, stars – however sparkly – do _not_ speak. Therefore, we shall put your visions on the account of a few too many Christmas punch, and get on with the story.

So, however, was the situation: there were the two stars, and there were the two voices, whether corresponding or not, and the conversation continued as such.

"_I think we should help them,"_ the first voice said hopefully.

"Help _them?" _the second was downright reprimanding. "_How so? We can't let them see us, you know–"_

"_Oh, come on! Just LOOK at them! They're madly in love and they're just going to screw up things! … I didn't say we should let them see us – just give them a bit of a pull, hm? I won't be that long – they won't even know they've been helped out of the mess they've created._

The two voices dies away then, arguing still, and – believe it or not – the two stars in the southwest corner stopped twinkling. They restored to their somewhat colder, unmoving glow of stars, the tiny, shining glint which they had held now totally disappeared, leaving them lifeless.

Maybe miracles do happen at Christmas.

-

The real mystery, Aoko thought, was what she was doing here, all alone in the slumbering Tokyo, in the midst of this chilly night. She wasn't even dressed in consequence – she had rushed out of her flat without even pulling on a coat or a scarf, without even knowing what she was doing it – and now the wind was piercing easily through her light jacket and slapping her cheeks without warning. Besides, it was beginning to snow. She rubbed her arms and glared up at the sky, half-wishing that her daggering stare could clear away the clouds.

Still she wouldn't go back home – not yet. As certain as she had been when leaving her apartment, she was positive she mustn't come back yet. The impression was strange; she felt like somebody was calling her from the corner of the street, but when she reached that there was no sound to be heard, and no-one to be seen… onward she walked, from dark street to dark street, drawn ahead by some invisible thread, and meeting nobody but her reflections on the blue-grey shop windows.

It is difficult to orientate oneself in a town at night. Shade and light don't have the same definitions as in daylight; they stretch and distort differently. They work along different schemes and patterns, which makes it difficult to be absolutely certain where one goes. Aoko vaguely recognised avenues and larger streets, but she had no idea where she was being led until she caught a glimpse of the tall top spire of the clock tower above the rooftops.

She skirted it from behind, so that the quadrangular square appeared gradually, the clock tower on the left, the small park on the right, facing it. Snow was falling silently in the dark. She advanced slowly, rubbing her cold-stiffened hands, her quizzical gaze sweeping in the lean figure of the building, and was paying so little attention to where she was going that she didn't realize somebody was doing the same until she collided with him.

The shock was so sudden and unexpected she tumbled backwards and fell onto the hard cold cobbles. For a moment she saw nothing but the delicate snowflakes swirling down in the wind, brushing lightly against her face, and a dark shape bent over her.

"I'm so sorry," the man excused himself, and the warmth of his well-known voice made Aoko's heart flutter in surprise. "Here…" he stretched a hand to help her stand up. She could discern, now, the wild dark hair and blue eyes, the jacket which she had more than once seen on her shoulders.

"Kaito?" she breathed out, pushing black bangs from her face. He looked stricken.

"Aoko?" Shock was audible in his voice. She accepted his un-gloved hand and scrambled up to her feet, then they stood facing each other, hesitant as to what to do, able only to remark the small details that had changed in one another's figure since they had last met.

He was taller. For a moment Aoko saw only this – he was much taller than before. His features too were sharper, more definitely affirmed; there was a more serious glint of blue in his eyes that spoke of maturity and manhood. It was incredible, considered Aoko, as she finally faced him with the ability to take in all those little variations she had never took pains to remark before, how in two months' separation her vision of him had turned from the boy's to the man's–

"Aoko…" he sounded truly astonished, "What are you doing here?"

For a half-second the idea pierced through her mind o snap at him to mind his own business – but this resolution melted immediately, in the excruciating blue of his eyes. "I–" she began, and then cut herself short; all of this now appeared perfectly absurd and pointless. "I don't really know. I wandered about in the town… I felt I had to come here. As if – somebody was…"

"… calling you," Kaito supplied. Aoko gazed at him puzzlingly; he was frowning, and his eyes seemed to be looking at something far away over her shoulder.

"… yes."

"Me too…" He looked back at her, and Aoko's breath immediately deserted her. His blue eyes, however serious, still had the same effect upon her – in spite of everything, she could still see inside them the same innocence as she had seen twelve years before, in this very place. She couldn't think of anything to say – once or twice she opened her mouth, but a gush of chilling wind drowned all words in her throat. The cold was, it seemed, increasing; so did her shuddering.

"You're cold?" he asked, abruptly. There was something like concern in his eyes now, while they swept rapidly on her light, open jacket and bare forearms. She forced a cheap smile onto her lips.

"Only a little."

Another one of those long silences. Embarrassment was flying between them like – almost concrete and yet so elusive, like that veil of flickering snowflakes – created from those two months' distance and the shameful remembrance of how bad their last meeting had turned out. How could any word to be spoken about this one sensitive subject, that would not immediately recall all the shouts from two months before – there was simply no way out of it.

At the moment they came to that painful realization, the bells began to ring.

In the cold, still night, they rang out very deeply, a clear, grave chime slowly filling up the while square with its sound. And memories flooded in with them – curling petals of a red rose, clear blue eyes and a laughing voice… "Here, I'm Kuroba Kaito! Nice to meet you!" Every bell seemed to be echoing those words from the past, as they went on their low, regular rhythm in the dead of the night, moving as profoundly as heartbeats. They counted them, one by one – eleven. The air seemed to vibrate around them, like ripples onto water, and snow was still falling, still gliding in the black, clouded sky.

One after the other, the bells slowed down and stopped – the last stricken note resounded deeply and then revolved into silence. They both looked back at each other; their senses felt sharpened by the shocks from the bells – each breath in their lungs, each gush of wind, each sting of cold was felt more acutely than before – and so was each other's presence. They were completely aware of each other's body now – every one of their limbs aching for being closer, _closer_…

Neither ever actually knew who made the first move, who strode faster of the two. What is really certain is that some two seconds later they were in each other's arms and their lips were in rather fierce collision.

Neither of them were very experienced kissers. In fact, they had no experience in kissing at all – in that matter, if not in others, they were both completely naïve and innocent. Still, what was at first a simple, shy pressing of the lips rapidly turned, after the first awkward experiments, into a much more intimate and passionate embrace – to his hands in her hair and her arms around his chest, to fingers digging in her back and lips opening to his as he bid entrance…

At that moment Kaito jerked backwards, so abruptly that Aoko stumbled. His arms slid free from around her and he staggered – Kaito _never_ staggered. "Kai–" She reached out but he deadpanned her with a raised hand and a stare that would have made a corpse swirl in its grave.

"Aoko – please – I should stop. We shouldn't do – this." Those chocked words had the effect of a cold shower on Aoko's shoulders. Of course – she'd been stupid enough as to think – _My God_, she thought, biting back the tears she didn't want him to see – in one second she'd been propelled from the heavens of his kiss to the cold, cold earth of his indifference. _I love you. I love you so much…_ She thought of their high school classes, and his mockeries about her womanliness, or lack thereof – she thought of his careless lies, reeled off without regard for her wounded feelings – she thought of their last meeting, when she'd confronted him with the blunt truth, and he had seemed to regret nothing, saying he'd done it and lied to protect them all… and when she'd told she hated him, turned away from her and never looked back.

… _and you will never be mine._

"I see," she said stiffly, turning away and straightening her ruffled jacket. "I'm sorry… of course, there's always been a good deal of fangirls after you, both as Kuroba Kaito and Kaito Kid… you've no matter with a tomboy like me. In two months you've probably had time enough to date, what, half a dozen of th–"

She was swirled around by an iron grip dragging her by the wrist, and very rapidly found herself enclosed against his chest by his two arms, her nose buried in his shirt while he spoke, his words rapid, almost frantic.

"There's no one – there's never been anyone – it was always you. There's never been anyone but you – if you have to believe one true thing about me, Aoko, if there was ever one thing true about me – this is it. How could I look at any other girl when you or your memory were always right by my side–"

Aoko drew her nose from his shirt in dismay. "But–"

"But–" his voice echoed hers, but graver and an octave lower, "but I'm Kaito Kid – the very man you've always loathed. So… we should stop. I've missed you too much over the last two months to e able to part with you so easily if this goes on." He loosened his embrace and grinned ruefully down at her. "Quick, or if you go on looking so beautiful I may lose control of myself and kiss you again."

Aoko put a remedy to that problem herself. It was very quick – her lips pressed possessively against his, her arms around his neck, pulling his head down to her – and she immediately stepped backwards, mouth still slightly open and cheeks flushed in spite of the cold.

"Ao–"

"I. Don't. Care," she said, and there was such fierceness in her voice that brought her forward again. "I don't care if you're Kid – I can't do anything against that. I don't care about your scruples and I don't care I'm hurt–" breaking into a smile for the first time, "–and I definitely _don't_ mind your kissing me again."

The moment of bewilderment was already passed – she hadn't finished talking that Kaito reached out for both sides of her head and did kiss her again. Her lips were still half-open and he made the most of that opportunity – his hands slid to her neck and pulled her upwards, causing her to lose slightly her balance. She slid her arms around his neck and leant into him, responding as much as she could and feeling marvellously light-headed.

If their first kiss had been deep and passionate, she thought, it was nothing compared to this – feelings and wants they had barely caught glimpses of. They were growing in their lungs, shortening every breath and making hands wander. It was physical attraction here, uncontrollable need for _closer_ contact and rational intercourse giving way to pure, bare, desperate want of each other. Needless to say that any notions of cold and freezing, chilling wind were completely forgotten.

After the first somehow wild minutes, however, the kiss softened considerably. Kaito's lips became less harsh and less attacking, and Aoko completely melted underneath. He'd stopped controlling the kiss and was merely leading her by now, letting her take initiatives and make experiments of her own. He probably knew well that he could be hurt beyond possible in doing so; that she could refuse him now for all his lies, break off the kiss and turn her back on him, and yet he accepted that risk like he accepted to gamble his life on a very thin edge during his Kid heists… Aoko never pulled away.

They did part once or twice, but only reluctantly, and merely for the matter of breathing, which they were rapidly coming to consider as insignificant. And the wind swirled and whistled around them, and the snow went on falling, light, veil-like, whitening the square's cobbles. It was a beautiful night sight, but neither of our two kissers had leisure enough to ponder upon that, or upon how much romanticism the situation provided them with.

In fact, there had no place at all in their mind for any consideration of the kind but for each other's presence. If the question did pierce though them of the coincidence that had led them both, in the middle of the night and without any previous rendezvous, in a place that held so many memories to them, the ensuing kisses soon drove all that wondering to another, less busy moment.

They went on kissing, oblivious of the time, the weather, the cold, everything but the warm contact of one another's bodies. The snow continued its silent course in the dark. And the wind went on swirling around them and the clock tower, its soft whistles around the tall, lean building sounding almost like chuckles.

Maybe miracles do happen at Christmas. Because it's the perfect time for them to happen.

-

**I'm sorry; maybe I cut it a little short by the end. I just thought there wasn't much to be said after that. It turned out to be hotter than I wanted to make it, but never mind – anyway, that's another shot done. See you tomorrow.**


	7. I'll Be Home For Christmas

**Author's note: Another Christmas-Carol fic! Another HeijiKazu fic! Yay! Boy, I hate that muse. You'll understand why. As usual, I'm not likely to own anything. Aah crap.**

**Theme #12: Staying behind**

**-**

**I'll Be Home For Christmas**

**-**

_I'll be there for Christmas_

_You can count on me_

_Please have snow and mistletoe_

_And presents on the tree…_

_-_

Kazuha's slender arms, very white in the darkness of the bedroom, stretched lazily around Heiji's chest, as she mumbled something in mid-sleep and snuggled closer to him. Her breath fell softly on his lips, as featherlike as the soft touches of her fingers against his shoulder, he and half-opened his eyes to meet the sight of her sleeping, slightly pouting face – what was she dreaming of? She'd whispered his name under her breath, or something that sounded very much like it. With a smile, he brushed aside the dark locks tumbling on her forehead and murmured, "I–"

–but then he opened his eyes fully and he was alone again, all alone in his cold sheets. He flopped on his back, arms spread, and stared at the ceiling – it had been a mirage like always, and like always it had felt real, so real that for a short, wonderful moment he'd actually believed Kazuha was once again by his side.

Even now he could remember everything about her – the sparkling green of her eyes, the softness of her mouth, the smoothness of her skin. Night after night they would fall asleep with each other's slow breathing in their ear, keeping as close as they could, arms and legs still entangled together. Morning after morning they would wake up and get into a pillow fight, laughing irresistibly and ending up, breathless, in each other's arms.

Then, one night, he'd gone to sleep alone.

He flung the covers aside and stumbled out of bed; the sheets' cold embrace was more than he could bear with. He shuddered – the winter night was cold and he was shirtless. He could almost feel Kazuha's hands sliding up his torso and her lips in his neck, stirring up emotions inside him like no other girl ever could… he did not want any other girl.

A lonesome moonbeam was sailing through the window slashing the room in two with a milky ray of light. Beyond that were only shades of grey, extinguishing into darkness. It reminded him irresistibly of times when Kazuha had just fallen asleep and he was holding her against his shoulder, her breath tingling against his skin the only sound breaking the perfect stillness and silence of the bedroom.

He dashed into the living-room, but worse was to come from here. His mother had raided his flat two days before, insisting in his getting a fir tree and decorating the whole apartment – he'd been lucky enough to limit her Christmas spirit to the living-room so she'd only admitted herself satisfied when she'd trimmed every wall of it with ivy and holly. She'd left late that night and he'd been too weary to bring them down; on the morning it'd appeared pointless to unhook them.

He should have, though, he pondered mournfully, leaning against the doorframe and contemplating the colourless decorations adorning the walls, the furniture and more or less everything else. His last Christmases he'd spent them with Kazuha, and now these only reminded him of times when he had laughed, when he had much rather cry now. Little did his mother know her attempt to cheer him up had miserably failed…

"Heiji?" A laughing Kazuha came out of the kitchen and he instinctively reached out for her, but she was neither looking nor talking to him. She put the plate down on the table and walked straight past him, her eyes focused on something he could not see, and her voice faded in his back, and the darkness fell again.

He finally slumped into a chair, knees drawn up to his chest like a child. He felt empty, weak… vulnerable. It was ironical enough from the great Tantei of the West, toughened up by years of murder cases and having a prefect of police for a father. If Neechan and Kudo saw him in such a state, they would go wild; but he would never, ever let either Neechan or Kudo (no, definitely not Kudo) see him so.

The front door opened and closed, and Kazuha switched on the hall light, taking off her coat as she entered the living-room and talking cheerfully. "Evening, Heiji, sorry I'm late–" –but she was gone again, the moment she bent down to kiss his lips. It had happened so many times he wasn't even surprised; there was only a cold hand closing around his heart again. He was used by now to her existing, within this flat, only in the realms of his memories, and to her going and passing, and then leaving again.

People, even amongst his closest friends (not Neechan or Kudo, though, because they knew that pain as well as him) told him that he would forget in time, and offered him books titled as such as, Ten Ways To Survive A Separation, but Heiji had never so much as opened them. They lay flat on a shelf on the other side of the room, where he'd piled them up and covered with others, completely forgetting their presence.

He didn't agree with those titles, anyway. This matter wasn't about survival – you could always survive when you had the means. It was mechanical; eating and walking and sleeping and working. No, this wasn't survival, it was merely subsistence. Staying alive. That's all.

"Heiji?"

He looked up, once again lured, as he always was, by his own daydreaming.

"What are you doing in the dark?" But she was gone, and with her the lights she'd just switched on. Something wet rolled silently down his cheek then dropped into eternity. He murmured her name, and it ran smoothly in the air, soft as silk, before rippling away.

The Christmas decorations were greyish in the dark. They hung still, from the walls and ceiling, colourful and yet colourless, meaningful and yet meaningless, and he wanted to ripe them all down.

Logical reasoning stopped him in his impulse. His mother and father were to come and eat tomorrow morning, and in the evening Neechan and Kudo. Two happy couples. They tried to cheer him up, he knew, and he tried to feel, or act, so. At least not make them worry. They weren't always fooled though.

He was tied up. Tied up by his memories and his connections with people he loved, like a thousand and a thousand threads, dark red in the shade of the living-room, weaving their web around him, entangling him, relating him to everything around, keeping him from moving too much without breaking something – or someone.

The front door opened again, and Kazuha's fresh voice ran down the hall, "Heiji? Hello, it's me…"

But he couldn't know if this was absolutely real, or another one of his dreams.

-

_Christmas Eve will find me_

_Where the love-light gleams_

_I'll be home for Christmas…_

… _if only in my dreams._

**-**

**The Post-Christmas Depressive Muse of Doom has struck early this year. I really, **_**really**_** don't know why. This series was meant to work on happily ever afters! Gomen to those who awaited fluff! I'll give you some tomorrow, I promise. Till then, do be so kind to review… ?**


	8. A Few Too Many

**Author's note: Christmas fluff… Kaito/Aoko fluff. Definite randomness! … A sequel to the Fireworks earlier fic. No, Kaito doesn't need any drugs. I wish I had such a best friend, too… but I own none. And if that wasn't enough, I don't own MK either.**

**Theme #2: Addict**

**-**

**A Few Too Many (Of Christmas Candy)**

**-**

One thing was clear: Kaito would never need to get on drugs. With him, Christmas candy was more than enough.

By the time Aoko came back from the kitchen with a plateful of just-baked cookies, the living-room was way, way worse than she had left it. The walls and ceiling were trimmed with garlands and holly, gold-and-silver tinsels, Christmas garments, red-and-white candy sticks and a puzzled-looking white dove perched on top of the tree – two woollen were hanging from the chimney, filled with small boxes brilliantly wrapped, and a light hum of 'Away in a manger' could be heard in the air. Aoko put her plate down and her hands on her hips.

"_Kaito_," she said, and the young magician stopped humming, turning to give her an interrogating look over his shoulder. He was munching on a lollipop stick.

"Hn?" His face lit up at the sight of the plate on the coffee table. "Cookies!" He jumped from the chimney in a careless, easy way, and the dove on top of the tree, disturbed by the sudden move, fluttered its wings and took flight. Kaito laughed, and Aoko frowned – she could see the fate of the cookies outlining in the horizon as clearly as she had foreseen the candies' destiny – deep down in his stomach, all of them.

"Gah! Don't eat them now! They're too hot!" She snatched the plate out of his reach.

"De-mo-Ao-ko-chan!"

"Don't 'Aoko-chan' me – I said you'll wait." He was hovering over her, childishly pouting for the cookies. Aoko hid them behind her back. "Taku, Kaito, you can be annoying at times…" She laid the plate down on the table, making a barrier of her body between it and the over-sugared cookie-obsessed magician who happened to be her best friend, and pretended to get interested in the tree's ornaments.

All right, Kaito had had his fun. Small Santa Clauses in crystal, a few dozen candles, toy doves on a thread, swaying from branch to branch, something with facets and very, very shiny – too shiny actually to be entirely made of glass – or maybe it was just her imagination, angels with fuzzy white wings, delicately cut stars and snowmen, tiny Kaito Kid figurines…

"Kaito! What the hell is that?" she brandished one of them, complete with top hat, cloak and monocle, under the nose of her best friend who barely threw a look at it.

"That? Oh, yeah," he grinned, "I thought they were cute. And they're very well done, too – every little detail…"

"I don't think my dad cares a lot about detail in such a case," Aoko hissed. "Unless he uses those as voodoo puppets, in which case Kid had much better hide his ass," and was glad this drew a face from him. "Just how _many_ of them have you hung in there?" Stalking away, she set about removing all the disgracing little creatures.

There were an awful lot of them. And they were all different, all bearing a different attitude and a different expression – mostly, a devilish grin such as those of the caricatures of himself Kid drew on his heist-notice cards – all of them the same and yet different each time, like countless and countless puzzle-like masks mocking time and serious thinking. They _were_ very well done, she had to admit, manufactured with care and precision by a meticulous artist. As far as she could see, the monocle was real glass, and the top hat and white cloak real, material fabric – all in all, the likeliness was as perfect as likeliness between man and toy can be. That mischievous smirk was as annoying as the real Kid's was…

"Really," she mumbled under her breath, just loud enough for him to hear her, "where did you even got th– don't even _think_ about it." She swirled on her heels with an armful of Kaito Kids and glared at Kaito, who'd stopped tiptoeing towards the cookies at the abrupt change of tone in her voice and was now managing to look genuinely guilty. "I told you to _wait_."

"All right, all right –" with this and a very innocent look, he snatched a candy stick from the tree, peeled the plastic off and popped it – the sweet, not the plastic – in his mouth. He could not have looked or acted more childishly. Aoko found it hard to remain angry with him when his deep blue eyes were piercing through her exactly like they had on their first meeting years before.

"Don't you think you've had enough candy for the rest of Christmas season?"

"Nope," he said, grinning, and then hopped away, humming a tune which she this time didn't think she recognized. Aoko sighed, watching his retreating back and gesturing hands as he carelessly drew pigeons out of thin air. "Hopeless," she grumbled, and went on picking up Kaito Kids.

She had to admit, once put aside all those shamefully precise puppets, the tree did very well. The dim glow of the candles created between the branches an intricate pattern when threads of light and shade delicately intertwined with one another. Only, in fact, the Kid figurines were out of place – the problem was, there seemed to be no end to them. When she thought she'd gathered them all, there was another popping up from behind a bunch of spines. Had Kaito not been on the opposite side of the room, busy applying stained-glassed Christmas stickers on the window, she would have suspected him to add them up when she wasn't looking.

"How _many_ of them have you put in here?" she repeated, catching swiftly the cloak of one of them, who was trying to escape by slipping between two branches. "Really, Kaito, you could have spared me that – do you know how my dad'll throw a fit if he sees one of those? He'll make a row of things and that–" and Kaito must have had a power of teleportation because in half a second he'd crossed the room and was standing by her side, popping a cookie in her mouth and making her effectively shut up.

"Stop complaining. And eat. They're good," he said, licking bits of chocolate chip off his fingers. Aoko glowered at him over her portion of cookie.

"And what exactly was that for?" she asked, when she could – they _were_ good, despite all his fussing around her while she was baking them (she'd ended up banishing him into the living-room, towards the candy-decorated fir tree, and _that_ was the result). "Do you think you can come up here and do whatever you want with my house and mess up with my cooking," that was pretty unfair since she'd invited him over but she didn't care about details, "trim the living room with Kaito Kids and get drugged with candy," she heard Kaito sigh and went on mercilessly, "don't you think that's really enough of Christmas spirit for a decade–"

And there Kaito must have been fed up for he then crushed his mouth against hers, making her, for the second time in a row, shut up.

Aoko's heart skipped to a stop. She gasped, and her hands gripped instinctively at his shoulders, burying in the fabric of his shirt. Something between a moan and a whisper must have escaped her when Kaito's fingers dug in her forearms, pulling her closer to him. His lips were warm and softly demanding, kissing hers open, deepening the kiss…

… and then it was gone, he'd raised his head (his hands didn't let her go, though); and there was nothing left but the memory of his mouth's shape and touch against hers.

"… candy," she murmured, her eyes locked with his. "You taste candy."

"You taste cookie," he replied, grinning. "Chocolate chip and sugar." He stole a peck at her lips again then grabbed her hands and began swirling them both in a spinning round, singing on the tune of whatever carol he was humming some minutes ago.

'_Turn up the lights, the day is done,'_ he sang blithely, beaming at a breathless Aoko.

'_Christmas spirit is in the air!_

'_Soon Christmas will be come and gone…_

"… but don't _you_ go anywhere," he murmured in her ear the moment his arms wrapped around her and tumbled them both onto the couch.

Aoko was stunned, to say the least. One second she had been whirling through the air, tripping and dizzying with speed; the other he was lying on a very stable couch, with Kaito's arm encircling her against his chest and the steady, profound beating of his heart beneath his fingers. His hands were slowly, swiftly running in her hair, while the room stopped spinning.

"You won't, will you?" His voice was warm near her ear. "Leave me?"

She rose awkwardly on one elbow and his falling hand trailed on her cheek one second, immediately bringing heat to her face. He looked no longer drunk – if he had ever been. "… reason why I should?" she asked suspiciously.

He shrugged and grinned, and there was somehow a glint of sadness in that shrug and grin. It was gone before Aoko could place it. "No reason." He sat up and she was caught off-balance, instinctively sliding her arms around his neck for support (or so she insisted later on…) That, as might be expected, brought them closer together. Their breaths merged, their hands froze, their eyes locked, and, as suddenly every limb in their bodies seemed to be yelling, aching for more, _more _closeness, they understood what exactly was meant by physical _attraction_.

It meant having tasted it once, and by doing so, without even remarking anything, having let the reminiscence of these touches and contacts become slowly more and more powerful; those were swift, unnoticeable needs. And yet, infiltrating them. Addicting them. Physically, it meant breaths catching and accelerating, chest rising and falling faster and faster, and deep own inside, rooted more deeply than they would ever have expected, the irresistible urge to bend forward and let their eyelids slid shut–

And then (since this is rapidly turning out to be one of the worst pieces of fluff I have EVER written), the front door slammed and Nakamori Ginzo's voice could be heard calling his daughter from the hall.

In half a second they were both scarlet and off the couch, Aoko coming forwards to greet her father and Kaito retreating by the Christmas tree.

"Ah… Tousan…" Aoko felt like she'd been dipped in boiling water. "How – how did the heist go?"

"Horrible," her father grumbled, taking off his coat and slumping it on the nearest chair. "A real hecatomb." He marked a pause and pulled a face at the sight of the over-decorated living-room, but went on, "That dumb Kid thought himself clever – ah, hello, Kaito-kun – to make fun of us with his lot of Christmas toys and fireworks…"

Kaito was coming up, hands in his pockets, all embarrassment from a moment before disappeared in a friendly, smiling Poker face. "I take it the thief succeeded in escaping you again," he said sympathetically.

"Yes – blast the man! Kid, next time I'll catch you, I swear! You will NOT escape me!"

Suddenly, the living-room had become extremely noisy. Nakamori-keibu, it appeared, had drunk some time with the Task Force, out of disappointment, and what he needed most right now was a large glass of water and a good night's sleep. After many struggles, therefore, they succeeded in tucking him into bed, where despite his many protests he immediately fell asleep. A great snore reached them as Aoko closed the door behind them.

"Really," she said, shaking her head, "Tousan's always exhausted during Christmas season. Kid's really a nuisance. He could at least have the decency to leave us alone for Christm– are you even _listening_ to me?" she snapped at Kaito, whose attention was already restored to the cookies. "_Taku…"_

He was hovering over her plate, choosing his first with deliberate care. He was extremely child-like, such as, Aoko thought, he was only with her; at school, he was building up a façade with his tricks, and he always took pains never to show himself too vulnerable to his mother, lest she should worry. Wit her, at least, he stripped off that mask. She had always wondered why this mark of trust. Now, she thought, touching her lips absently… maybe she had an idea.

"When it comes to cookies, Aoko, you're the best cook ever," he praised, licking his fingers with a very satisfied air. "They're as good as candy…"

"What makes you like candy so much?" asked Aoko, now sitting on the couch with her arms folded. Kaito looked up like a surprised cat disturbed in his licking a bowl of his favourite milk.

"Hm?"

She repeated her question. Kaito looked puzzled – then once again teleported he was leaning over the couch and taking her face between his hands and kissing her lips. He didn't go any further than a simple pressure of mouth against mouth, and when he drew back he was grinning. "Because…" his breath was softly tickling her nose and cheekbones, "because I've always thought you'd taste like that when I'd kiss you."

"And?" she whispered; she felt that any loud noise might break the emotional tension that was woven around them.

"–and I was right." He bent down again, his lips only a breath away, Aoko felt her eyelids flutter down…

… then a loud, enormous snore from the next room broke it all down. Kaito staggered on the spot. "Can't the author leave us only an ounce of romantic atmosphere?" he cursed (no, I can't), but he was laughing. Aoko found out she was laughing too.

He helped her to her feet, humming yet again that silly carol and reaching out for another candy, which he this time popped into her mouth. Aoko smiled, and, wrapping her arms around his neck, accepted to be kissed by the boy who was in love with candy.

-

**I promised thee fluff, I gave thee fluff! I hope you enjoyed it… especially after yesterday's angst… anyhow, Christmas vacation is tomorrow (yes, I've got school on Saturdays) and then I'll be able to update better and earlier in the day – I'm sorry this is always so late…**


	9. O, Christmas tree!

**Author's note: Hullo, everyone! This is the last Heiji/Kazuha fic of this series… and possibly the fluffiest. I'm afraid I can't help it n-n Anyway you HeijiKazu fans enjoy it as a last Christmas presents from me. Unless you're also KaitoAoko and ShinRan fans, in which case you'll have to bear with me a bit longer!**

**Okay, so this is normally the direct continuation of 'O-miai serenade', in my What If series. At least, Kazuha's mom and the relationship between Heiji and Kazuha correspond.**

**I don't own anything. What, you didn't know?**

**-**

**O, Christmas tree!**

**-**

"_What?"_ The Christmas garment Kazuha was currently holding fell to the floor and shattered into a thousand golden shards. If the stool she was standing on could have staggered all by itself, it would certainly have. "Tell me you haven't said what you've just said," she groaned. Her father fidgeted on the doorstep.

"Well, you see… your mother was very keen as to have you…"

"… as a bait for rich pretenders," Kazuha completed harshly. "Last time it was that O-miaï thing, now it's a Christmas party – out of the question." She whirled back to tree and the box of Christmas ornaments. "You can go back and tell her," she added, picking up a silver garland and arranging it between the branches. "End of the discussion."

"Tell me what?" her mother's suave voice came up from behind her father's back. Kazuha stiffened automatically, and the garland dropped a few inches. "Kazuha dear," (entering the living-room) "don't tell me you don't intend to come with me at the Hakubas' Christmas dinner? They hold one year, and they've been so kind as to invite us as their particular guests…"

"Like everybody else," Kazuha cut in – she hadn't forgiven her mother the O-miaï fiasco. "I've met Hakuba Saguru once, after that lavender murder case," a vague wave of the hand in the direction of the window, "and he was a very nice person and everything, but really _too _proud of himself. I loathe those parties. Everyone's so always well-dressed and so well-mannered, and they always despise those who are neither…"

Her mother's eyes considered critically her too large T-shirt and jeans, and carelessly brought-up hair, then slid to the scattered remnants of the destroyed Christmas garment. "Well, I suppose that can be helped," she said, in the voice of Doom. "Besides, I've already said yes for you and me." Her voice hardened and Kazuha looked sullen. "After what shame you've put me through during that O-miaï, Kazuha, I'd expect you to come up with some more self–"

"That's incredible!" Kazuha exclaimed, abandoning every pretence of trimming the tree. "I didn't want to go to that O-miaï! Those two men–"

"–are more than ten times out consequence," her mother interrupted airily – and then suddenly switched to so sweet and tender a voice Kazuha was caught completely off-guard. "Of course, if that Hattori boy hadn't been there to impress on you and take you away, they would have liked you very much, Kazuha-chaaan…"

"Don't you put Heiji into this," huffed Kazuha.

Her father, who had so far been following their exchange with polite respect for a mother and daughter's affectionate bond, thought it good in interfere here. "Heiji-kun," he said sententiously, "is a very good kind of boy, and…"

"Never mind that," his ex-wife dismissed him with a careless shrug. "I do not regard your intimacy with 'Heiji-kun' with a good eye, Kazuha…"

"He's like a brother to me!" Kazuha cried out desperately, ignoring the small voice inside her screaming the exact contrary. "The brother I could have had but never did because you _left home_, remember?" She jumped off her stool and set up to picking up the remains of the late garment, turning an obstinate back at her mother. She was waiting for some cool, scornful to fall down, but surprisingly it didn't – and when she eventually cost a cautious glare over her shoulder, her father alone was standing on the doorstep, looking down at her severely.

"Don't look at me that way, Tou-san!" she protested. "And I'm NOT going to that party!"

-

And this is how less than twenty-four hours later, Kazuha found herself locked up in her room, with a blue dress awaiting her on her bed and an ultimatum still ringing in her ears, "And if you're not ready in half an hour, young girl, you won't be allowed out of your room until New Year!" Slam.

Her reflection glowered at her from the mirror. Her mother had dragged her to the hairdresser, and her dark-brown hair was now elaborately brought up at her nape, in such delicate intertwining of locks and pearls that she dreaded its breaking down every step she took. To say nothing of its breaking down while putting on the dress, or whatever was that… veil-and-lace thing supposed to be.

"Since when," she asked out loud to her reflection, "do parents push their children to wear unclothed clothes?"

Her reflection shrugged and walked off-frame. Kazuha sighed – thou too, Brute? She was abandoned by all – and lifted cautiously something sparkly which might and might not have been a sleeve, then dropped it back. She was positive everything and everyone at that party would be like that, too – affected, off-the-shoulder and disgustingly rich. Amidst that mess, she would get mixed up between the salad fork and the oyster fork, and if she ever was to be invited to dance, she would undoubtedly trip on her partner's feet half the time.

"Never, never," she swore, restlessly pacing her room. "Even provided I could get inside that dress,, I will NOT attend that party – I _won't!_ They can't make me–"

A knock at the door made hr jump and clutch something. "Are you ready?" her mother's distant voice asked. Kazuha could imagine her very well, tapping her fingers listlessly on the doorknob and consulting her watch every two seconds.

"_No,"_ she snarled. There were no questions asked. After a few moments' silence footsteps could be heard retiring.

The clock on her wall was letting time pass on, ticking by the seconds, ticking by her thoughts. Go – not go. The dilemma kept rising before her – she hated the simple idea of going, but she knew her mother well able to carry out her threat; and staying shut in her room until New Year wasn't a happy fate. She had friends to see – she wanted to meet Heiji–"

Clack.

She turned on her heels to her window, but there was nothing to be seen – only the darkness of the evening, and the slow swirling of snowflakes. It had begun snowing some two hours before, when the night had set, and the ground must be well covered with whiteness by now. She turned back to her scowl at her dress.

Clack. Clack clack.

This time she had been fast enough to catch a glimpse of something falling back after it'd hit the glass – round and small, like a pebble. She approached it cautiously, sweeping away the condensation. There was a dark silhouette down there, looking up at her and beckoning. She could barely see his face, through the darkness and the falling snow and the glass rapidly saturating again, but–

"Heiji!" she called, sliding the window open. A gust of chilling wind greeted her, making her shiver. "What are you doing here? Why didn't you come up front?"

"I heard your mother was there," he said grimly. "You took your sweet time." His voice was warm even through the cold, and Kazuha clung on this warmth desperately like she would have clung on a lifebuoy, rejoicing in its familiarity and in the usual feeling it inflicted to her heart.

"Yeah," she murmured, looking down – she had always known what Heiji thought of her mother. "She wants me to go to a Christmas party–"

"I know."

Kazuha started, then understood – in such cases the Transmission Network Number 1 was their fathers. She was about to ask what he'd come here to do when he added, "Come on down."

"What?"

"Come down here? You don't want to go to that party, do you?" His dark eyes pierced through her, scanning her, understanding her. As always. "I'm taking you away from your horrible mother. Take a jacket. It's cold out here."

Kazuha was hesitating – her missing the Hakubas' party and whatever _charming young men_ she could have met there would cost her a lot. When her mother would discover she was gone, she would be pissed (and when her mother was pissed, generally everybody around was, too). But she recognised that look on Heiji's face; last time she'd seen it, he'd dragged her out of an O-miaï without even asking her opinion. So if he'd chosen to kidnap her once more, she couldn't very well resist him, could she?

A rapid smile tugged at her lips and she answered, "All right. Wait a second – I'll be right back." She disappeared from the gold-lit frame and quickly was back again, slipping into a jacket and spanning over the windowframe.

Climbing down from the first floor to the ground was cake – one hand on the windowledge, one feet on that small stone plinth – she had done this, and so had he, a million times since they were kids. Still, the snow and frost made it easier to slip and fall, and Heiji surveyed her descent with caution, his hands free to be able to catch her if needed. She jumped the two metres left and was standing before him, grinning, her hair a bit down, cheeks flushed with intensity and with the sudden cold.

"Where're we going?" she asked in a whisper – she looked like a child granted with a surprise. Heiji shoved a helmet in her hands. "Not telling." And led her towards his bike.

Kazuha awarded a last look to her house as she settled behind Heiji, sliding her arms around his chest. Most of the windows were lit; she could see her father's dark silhouette moving about in the living-room. Her mother was probably upstairs, outside her bedroom, barking at her to hurry up. Sometime or other she would get bored of waiting and would storm inside, icy reproaches all ready on her lips – and she would find the room empty and the window open, the curtain flapped back by the wind.

No regrets.

The bike roared and, with the usual feeling of falling from a cliff, immediately put up speed, sinking them both in the night.

It was pitch-black now – the only lights were the bike's and the glow of passing streetlamps, casting their elongated shadow on the roadway only to drown them in the dark. It was snowing harder, and visibility was bad; Kazuha's fingers were red with cold as they gripped tightly at Heiji's jacket. Wind was gushing from all around them, taking the breath out of their lungs, whilst they roamed on through the streets and let speed drunken them to dizziness.

Kazuha had no idea where they were going – all she could see were blurs, light, dark, light, dark. Only her touch sense was accurate; the pounding of her heart, the roaring of the bike beneath them, Heiji's back strong against her cheek and the contact of his cloth under her fingers… the sensation of total freedom that kept growing deep inside was probably an ephemeral feeling similar only to a silver bubble, but after being closed, pressured under like she had been those last twenty-four hours, it was exhilarating. For all she knew, or cared, Heiji could have rode on and on and never stopped – she would have clung on for dear life and never have let go. She didn't mind its lasting forever, and only dreaded its eventual, inevitable stop.

When it did stop, however, she was feeling to dizzy even to realise the speed had gone. Heiji gently unhooked her fingers from around him, retrieved the helmet from her and ticked it back under the bike's back seat while Kazuha, staggering onto the sidewalk, gazed speechlessly at the over-hanging shapes of their school's buildings and the great fir tree, trimmed with a thousand lights and silvery glimmers, which now stood on the snow-covered grounds.

The effect of all these lights, in the darkness, was impressive. It illuminated is surroundings in a warm, clear way, and lit the school's façade in its tiniest details; the whiteness of the snow below appeared littered with burning stars. Kazuha watched it all in awe, condensation escaping her parted lips and blurring her sight.

"They've placed it there last night," Heiji said, coming up with two cans of actually hot coffee (and where he'd kept them warm she didn't want to know). "I passed just when they'd finished. It's more impressive tonight, though."

Kazuha accepted the coffee more than gladly – in spite of the perfect beauty of the night sight and the absolute romanticism of the snow swirling and whirling in the dark, she was frozen to death. The blessed liquid ran down her throat, burning her tongue on the way but she didn't care; the bitterness of the drink was chasing the cold away.

"So if I get this straight," Heiji said – they were now sitting on a stone bench beside the tree, after they'd brushed the snow away, "your mother wanted you to go to that party and trip over your partner's feet all night–"

"Well, she didn't exactly expressed it that way, Kazuha interrupted ("Could have told myself," Heiji mumbled), "but even after the O-miaï disaster she hasn't given up her matchmaking me with eligible young men. If I'd gone to that party they would all have been formal and affected, and they wouldn't have looked down to me anyways–"

"–and they wouldn't have stood a kendo round with me," Heiji completed. He stood up and took a few steps, admiring the tree and finishing his coffee. Kazuha's eyes followed him on, while her thoughts all roamed upon what he'd just said, feeling, not for the first time, that the O-miaï fiasco had at least had the merit of shifting them in their places. The Ahou quarrels were still as present as ever, maybe even more so, but Heiji's vision, it seemed, had changed, if only a little. He was showing himself more affectionate and perhaps more caring, and if they hadn't gone quite as far as even holding hands yet, they were definitely closer to dating now than ever before. It was quite possible to plummet to nothingness, but… Kazuha was ready to take the chance.

"You're cold?" he asked, coming up while gulping down the last sips of his coffee. "Your hands are red." He didn't wait for any answer; he pulled off his gloves and tossed them on her lap. Oblivious to any protests, he turned away again.

Kazuha couldn't help a smile. 'See what I mean?' she thought to nobody in particular, and put on the gloves.

The snow was thinning out, having now covered a considerable portion of the grounds. Heiji's footprints went from the fir tree to the school's porch and back to the tree again, where they were most numerous. From this spot he could get a perfect sight of one kid-like ahou, who sat a few yards from away and was finishing her coffee while kicking in the air. It was childish, but her flushed cheeks and – now – wild hair, contributed to make her absolutely adorable.

Now, the quietness and silence of the place, its peaceful atmosphere, cooled the irritation which had agitated him ever sicne his father had told him – what, one hour ago? – how Kazuha's mother had once again come up with one of her twisted schemes to find a eligible pretender to her daughter's charms. In one glance, he'd seen it unfold all over again – the helplessness on Kazuha's face when she'd almost pleaded him to accompany them to the O-miaï, the haughty looks of those two men, certain of their power, ready to take possession, the torn paper napkin on her lap and the huge tears which had rolled down her face when he'd taken her in his arms.

He hadn't paused to think about the consequences of his actions. The minute after he roared out of the house and on his bike. He hadn't checked his speed until he reached Kazuha's house, and when he'd finally been able to catch her attention, and call her to the window, he'd seen on her face the same dismay there'd been on that O-miaï day, in her green eyes, gazing down at him puzzlingly, the same call for help on her lips as she'd almost formed in words back then, when he'd held the taxi door for her. So, like that day, he'd stolen her away.

He hadn't paused to think.

"Heiji!" she cried out gaily while he gazed up absently at the tree's heavy branches. H turned to her, ready to call back – and found himself thanked for his attentions first by a snowball smacking him in the face, then by herself flinging her arms around his neck and kissing hi full mouth.

She tasted… coffee. Her lips pressed against his, soft in touch, tender in shape, while they spun around under the impulse she'd given to her run. Heiji's arms mechanically closed around her, and before he knew his fingers were digging in her definitely destroyed hair and pulling her head down to kiss back. His first and only thought, at the moment, was that had he known it felt so good, he would have kissed her much sooner.

When she pulled back, she didn't look a bit shameful. Her eyes fixed seriously into his, and her lips still curling from the kiss murmured, more in a breath than in a whisper, "thank you… for saving me from my mother and that Hakuba party."

She sounded drunk. Did coffee have that effect upon her?

She leaned in; he could feel the caress of her breath only millimetres away from his own lips. "Heiji, I… I've always wanted to tell you…" she moistened her lips unconsciously, leaning closer still – Heiji was frozen. "I…"

And then swatted him over the head with another snowball, which, visibly, she had kept in her hand all along. Coughing and spluttering, Heiji felt her arms slide from around his neck, and she leaped away from his grip in a burst of laughter. Partly blinded, he heard the snow crush under her feet as she ran. He shook his head to fly away the wet locks that kept falling in his face and stooped, shoving round to make a snowball of his own – only to receive another one right under his left ear.

"One direct hit!" he heard her exclaim not too far-away.

"Why, you–" he growled, but then she flung herself at him once more and kissed him again – only this time he was stooping in very insecure balance and they both tumbled backwards in the snow. The cold immediately encountered Heiji's back and shoulders, sweeping through his clothes and biting at his skin. The snowball from a minute ago had slid to his neck and infiltrated his collar, freezing him to the core. He ha to resist fiercely the urge to flap her onto her back and let her know the cold, too, and instead put the eagerness into kissing back, sliding his hands to her neck, into her hair, and entangling their legs together.

Even after they had stopped they didn't say a word. They kept in each other's arms, without moving, without speaking, without complaining about the cold they didn't even feel anymore.

Keeping warm.

-

"you'll be okay?" Heiji asked, still sitting on his bike with one hand on the saddle while Kazuha removed her helmet and handed it back.

She glanced rapidly at her house and nodded. "I guess so. My mother will throw a fit, but…" she shrugged. "I don't care. I've spent a better Christmas party with you than with any of those guys at the Hakuba household." She addressed him one of those smiles that could melt snow at first sight. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," he said. "Are you sure you don't want me to come with you?"

She laughed. "Heiji, my mother disliked you even before the O-miaï fiasco. She began to hate you because we ran away back then. If she sees you tonight she'll probably try to rip your eyes out with her nails."

"Charming perspective," Heiji observed. Kazuha grinned, then sneezed. "You haven't caught a cold, have you?"

"They must be talking about me right now." She rubbed her nose. "I'll guess I'll go in. Thank you for tonight," she repeated.

A small silence. Then Kazuha rose on tiptoe, placed hr hands on Heiji's shoulders, and touched his lips with hers.

Very softly. Barely touching. Heiji didn't try and deepen it; they'd had enough that night of deep and intimate kisses. As it was – her bangs brushing against his face, his fingers running in her brown locks – it was just as well. (Absorbed as they were by the present situation, neither of them remarked the curtain that was lifted then dropped at one of the house's windows.)

Kazuha finally pulled away, a smile curling at the corners of the mouth he'd just kissed. "Now," she said, "you had better kiss me first thing in the morning tomorrow. I'm tired of always having to make the first move."

Heiji suspected she didn't only refer to kissing by that. Feeling somewhat guilty for some reason, he said, "Don't worry. Now get back inside – you'll really catch a cold if you stay too long in the same place without moving."

Kazuha doubted it. If anything, she felt warm – a light, golden glow growing stronger and stronger deep down in her chest. "Goodnight," she said softly. They shared one last hug, then giving his hand one last squeeze, she turned back to her house. Once on the mat, she gave Heiji one last glance and opened the door.

She disappeared from his sight, towards the lit entry and the icy look and words of her mother – and the warmth never left her.

-

**Nothing much to say. Merry Christmas to all HeijiKazu fans! See you tomorrow…**


	10. One Day In Advance

**Author's note: Because I thought it was just SO cute… three left, counting this one! (guess what. I'm writing this while watching DC amvs on You Tube… Rapidly I Shall Become Incurable…)**

**Theme #5: Almost there**

**-**

**One Day In advance**

**-**

Everything in the winter morning was cold, peacefulness and silence. The white dawn was completely frozen in deep quietness and stillness – not a sound, not a voice, not even a bird chirping lightly and fluttering its wings in a tree's branches. The sky was a pale silver while a white sun rose slowly up, barely veiled by a smoke-like mist. It was yet much too early for anyone to be out – not on vacation time – and, sure enough, downtown Tokyo was absolutely deserted, and all Beika streets completely still…

Then this perfect silence was most abruptly crackled by the thundering noise of a child bumping out of bed and racing all the way down the corridor to his parents' bedroom.

"Da-ad! Mo-om! It's Christmas!" he yelled, flinging open the door. An audible groan responded him as his parents grumpily shifted beneath the bedsheets and went back to sleep. By no means discouraged, the eight-years-old boy dashed forward, climbed up on the bed with such easiness and speed that only demonstrated years of habit, and dropped himself on his father's legs.

"Da-a-ad! It's _Christ_mas! You must wake up!"

The young father rolled on his side and, opening one blue eyes, focused his blurred gaze onto the alarm clock. Said alarm clock stood proudly on the bedside table, claiming the earliness of such a forced awakening. "Conan, it's way too early for that," he mumbled, and let his head fall back on his pillow exhaustedly.

"But it's _Christmas_! was the kid's cry, directly from the heart.

"No, darling," muttered his mother, sliding a lazy arm around her husband's chest and snuggling closer to him, "Today the 24th, it's only Christmas Eve…"

"But that's the same!" Conan began hopping up and down on his father's knees, obviously believing that would undoubtedly get fuller attention. Instead he received only louder groans. "Come on, wake up! We've got loads of things to do!"

"Not on Christmas Eve," his father said in his pillow. He drew his son close for a rapid kiss on the forehead. "And certainly not so early in the morning. Now go back to sleep, kiddo."

"But I won't be able to sleep…" Conan voice was already heavy with sobs, and they could well imagine his pouting face and pursued lips. Both parents opened their eyes rather hurriedly and stretched to take him in their arms. They soothed him up with comforting little nothings until he was completely calmed, and he curled up in the gap between them, his head resting on his father's shoulder his arms knotted around his mother's neck.

"Now," she said softly, "if you really can't sleep anymore, go watch cartoons downstairs and we'll come down in a few minutes for breakfast. Right?" she added, tenderly stroking her son's hair. A huge grin was spreading over his childish mouth.

"Hai!" He jumped out of bed and ran for the door, then shot back. "Ne, ne, you'll come, won't you?" he asked feelingly, clutching at the bed's bars. Upon receiving an affirmative answer he grinned again – the kind of grin that made him look just like his father at that age minus the glasses – and dashed away. They heard him storm down the stairs into the living-room.

Shinichi flopped back in his pillows, rubbing his drawn-out features. "God, what did I _do…_" he mumbled in his hands, rolling on his side to face his wife. Who was grinning, very much amused by the dialogue between father and son.

"Love," she said, chuckling. "To me." Shinichi smiled back. After ten years of marriage, and eight of motherhood, Ran still proved to be exceptionally patient with the masculine representatives of the household.

"I'd do that again," he murmured, drawing her closer. Their lips met, and that kiss was just as blissful as the first one had been, back to a rainy evening when they were eighteen. Just as blissful as every one they had shared in the interim had been. "I'd do that anytime…" He pulled her on his shoulder, where she leant, one arm around his waist, the other resting on his chest, fingers lightly tracing figures and patterns on his skin. Closing their eyes, delighting in their close embrace, both parents tasted peacefulness for the first time in the whole Christmas season…

… until another childish voice, but several years younger than the first one had been and obviously belonging to a little girl, cried out gaily in the momentarily restored silence, "Mo-om! Da-ad! It's _Christ_mas!"

**-**

**I know, Christmas Eve is only tomorrow… but I'm posting this on the evening of the 23th, so most of you will read this on the morning and it's good timing actually. So then, see you tomorrow!**


	11. Rose In Snow

**Author's note: Last AokoKaito one! Cheeeeeers! Ahem – sorry. I'm definitely getting to the end there. Tomorrow's will be ShinRan, and then – I'm done!**

**Nope… I didn't acquire DC or MK's rights during last night. Sorry.**

**-**

**Rose In Snow**

**-**

When Kuroba Kaito and Nakamori Aoko announced that they would be room-sharing during college, nobody was surprised. Their having been together thorough primary school, middle school and high school, naturally implied their being together in university, and if they were not – as such was the case – that they would live together to compensate. Everybody knew, much better than themselves did, that they completed too much to be able to do without the other.

It did take them some time to accustom themselves to sharing lives in such a way – not dating, but roommates anyway. Not only that their usual everyday already appeared as a comic manga to anyone having not been introduced and falling in the middle of a mop chase, but living together necessarily implied crossing boundaries that had never crossed before, even between two best-friend-dating-without-really-doing-so.

The first Christmas they spent it in tranquil intimacy. It wasn't really the first time of that – when they were younger and Nakamori was too busy putting up schemes against Kid through the whole night, Aoko often went to spend the evening at the Kurobas'. If both had to lunch the following day at their respective families, Christmas Eve was a mutual moment of movies, popcorn, and a nice bottle of champagne. And, if they finally came to kiss in the middle of the film, and were very close to making out right there on the couch, it was entirely the latter's fault, that was very clear.

Both were very reserved on that subject the following morning. In fact, they were both in a hurry to leave, rather to be left in the embarrassment resulting from their sudden and uncontrollable move towards each other – and, when they met again on the evening, decided of an implicit but common agreement _not_ to mention the kiss.

But things settled up again to the usual routine that ought never to have been broken, to skirt-flapping and mop-chasing and pigeons-feeding and tricks-making, and the second year was more or like alike to the first. Both resumed their one moment interrupted lives, with all that they included of normality and abnormality, both completely oblivious to the fact that the crack created could not entirely heal. They had never considered it as risky to live together, but they really had no idea – and should have, perhaps more in Kaito's case than in Aoko's – how much common life relied mostly on trust – and how many secrets would inevitably be revealed.

The second Christmas came, and was a disaster.

-

The night from the 23rd to the 24th of December is traditionally the longest and the most exciting. Anticipation of the next day's pleasures often keeps one from sleeping, and the most of the night is spent under one's sheets, waking and drifting and waking and drifting off.

So, on that ever-awaken night, Aoko would have liked very much to now why Kaito was running water at – god, one in the morning. He had broken a dream all the more precious that she was afraid she might not come back to it once she'd told him off properly. Grumbling and swearing under her breath that he'd get the fish revenge first thing in the morning, Christmas spirit or not Christmas spirit, she crawled out of bed and into the living-room.

It was empty and shaded in blue and black and silver. The window was open – she'd closed it before going to sleep, hadn't she? – and the curtains were flying under the cool night wind, casting their greyish shadow onto the rectangle of milky moonlight the window frame outlined on the floor. It was all very silent and still, but for that noise of running water from the bathroom – he was taking a shower. At one in the morning. What the _hell–!_

Apart from that, however, everything looked average and perfectly normal – except, perhaps, the heap of white… things tossed carelessly by the table's feet. Aoko's anger rocketed to levels unknown before – she'd taken care of ordering the living-room the day before so that they'd had a nice Christmas dinner, and he was just messing it up. She went up to the jumble, intending to throw it at his face when he'd come out of the bathroom, and stooped to pick up one cylinder item which had rolled a bit astray from the others… and then stopped in mid-gesture.

It was a hat. A white top hat. Blue ribbon. There was a red tie inside it. Just like… just like…

She dropped it.

Her eyes leaped to the jumble, and she was already recognising it all, though her mind refused to admit it for real – the shoes, the jacket, the cloak, all of them white, looking pure, completely innocent, as though their presence there was a perfect coincidence… she shoved them away and under them was the blue shirt, only as she lifted it cautiously, afraid it might blow up to her face, a red, wet liquid began to drip slowly from it to the floor, with a soft sound.

She felt like she was sinking. Perhaps it was only her legs dropping her to the floor, unable to sustain her anymore.

Her numb fingers caressed the item she'd just found, the small triangular charm dangling at the end of the string impossible to miss. The glass and metal was cold and hard, and it called her back to reality with a start, when she saw into it the reflection of her own blue eye. It sparkled lightly in the moonshine, just like did another glassy, facetted thing that lay on the carpet just beside her, and which she would _not_ even glance at. It was horrifyingly real.

The room suddenly felt really grand. So did the consequences, as she slowly came to realize the best part of them all – and they were too incredible for her not to believe them, not when impossibility was staring at her in the face. The more she saw of the matter, the _real_ matter, the more it unfolded itself to her in ways she hadn't remarked before – but no tear would come out, not even when she realised that what hurt most was not really all his lies, but that he hadn't trusted her – that he had never, ever through their last years of relationship, even during their life together, he had never trusted her.

"Aoko?"

She looked up at him with a jerk of the head – he was coming out of the bathroom, trousers on, shirtless, a towel drying his wet, wild hair. His eyes slid from her crouching figure to the clothes on the floor, and the jewel on the carpet, sparkling and glittering all the way, then back to her face, finally looking in her eyes without so much as a blink.

Denying nothing at all.

Aoko felt her lips move, though she couldn't remember having decided to move them. "You're Kaito Kid," she said, and her voice sounded empty even to her. Desperately, she sought protest or even embarrassment on his face in the seconds' silence that ensued, but his features were frozen in a mask she had never recognised as such.

"Yes."

Denying nothing at all, until the end. Her fingers tightened around the monocle's frame, and she got to her feet and walked to her bedroom door like in a dream, without glancing at him.

"Aoko… Aoko!"

The door shut with a click and it sounded strangely in the bedroom's silence. She leant against it and then crumpled to the floor, knowing that on the other side of the panel he was probably cursing himself for his stupidity. It was stupid indeed – the simple idea of living with her was stupid from the start. He risked being recognised any moment… But then why had he done it?

Her eyes still wouldn't cry. She stared down at the monocle she was still clutching in her hand, and had to resist the urge to throw it on the wall opposite, and to hear her heart that would shatter with it.

Eventually the morning must have come, for the room was now glittering with the grey light of winter early hours. She must have fallen asleep some time of other – but she hadn't moved a hair, and she didn't remember having diverted her eyes from the red spot on her bedcover. Minutes, hours had just elapsed away. Maybe days.

For a moment the thought pierced through her that it was December 24th, Christmas Eve, but the happiness induced in this statement soon disappeared in the gloom of her situation. It was difficult to believe than some hours before she'd been laughing with a boy who could only be hated from now on… maybe that was the worst thought, the one on which she had dwelt most – that she should have to hate her best friend, whom she would have trusted to hell and then back without a second of hesitation.

There was a slight noise on the other room for the first time in hours – several noises. A creaking, and a sharper sound, as though something was slid and clicked shut, then the characteristic noise of a paper being flipped over and a pen picked up. Moving her stiff limbs for the first time in hours, she got weakly to her feet and opened the door a creak.

Kaito was standing by the table, fully dressed now, a black travelling bag hoisted on his shoulder. A backpack on coasters was set against the nearest table. He was holding a pen and paper, which he was staring at grimly.

"Kaito?" She couldn't catch back the word, and he immediately looked up, putting the notebook and pen back down. He was completely silent, however, for a moment, and when he spoke Aoko thought his voice sounded coarse.

"Oh. You're here. Good."

'Good' wasn't exactly the adjective Aoko would've chosen to qualify her own presence at the bedroom door, barefoot and in her pyjamas, but strangely Kaito sounded almost… relieved. She clutched at the door for protection and asked defiantly, "What are you doing? What's with all the luggage?"

He stared at her disbelievingly. "Aoko, you didn't think that after this night I'd simply come up and take my breakfast?" He gestured at his backpack. "I'm leaving."

That triggered something in Aoko's chest, though she wasn't sure what – her heart skipping a beat, or her lungs refusing he sudden breath she'd drawn in. Her whole body was aching for touch, for coming forward, walking up in his arms – but her mind was disgusted at the mere idea that it'd be Kaito Kid she'd be thus hugging.

"… leaving," she finally said very softly. He smiled a sad smile at her, looking dead serious. She had never seen that smile. It was the end of their cohabitation, of their living together something like a year and a half of their day-after-day routine, she thought, and wondered why, no more than the night before, she still wouldn't cry.

"It'd have been awkward to leave you a note," he added with a rapid wave at the pages on the table. Aoko hardly glanced at it.

He waited for her to say something more, but as she kept resolutely silent, he eventually picked up his backpack and rolled it towards the door. Aoko's eyes followed him emptily. Only when his hand was on the handle, and she heard the metallic cleaking of the door opening, did some kind of impulse pull her forward, and his name escape her lips.

He stopped and turned, but slightly. He was standing right under the mistletoe they'd hung above the threshold less than forty-four hours earlier; back then he'd crushed her cheeks with a big wet kiss before rushing into the kitchen to pull new-baked cookies out of the oven. It felt a lifetime away.

"Kaito…" she dared not approach him too closely, not knowing what he might do. Kaito smiled again, Poker Face remaining perfectly safe though it was the first time he wanted it so badly to crash.

"Thank you," he said, "for your friendship. It was great knowing you all this while." He stepped outside, rolling his backpack behind him, and began to close the door. "Sayonara, Aoko."

"Kaito!" Aoko dashed forward, but fell only onto a closed door. She could have opened it easily, run after him – she could hear the clacking of the coasters in the stairs. Instead, a shooting pain searing through her brain, she flung herself the other way round and pressed her back against the door, breathing too rapidly. She stared into the living room, where the morning's golder light was playing in small streams n the table's polished surface.

The Christmas decorations hung all over the place again, now colourful and littered with sequins. They didn't seem to mean much any longer.

-

The following year passed like a year's dream. Going to different universities meant having no daily basis to meet on, and they never came across in the street, so that Aoko finally deduced he'd probably moved to another district. Routine settled in, unidentifiable until it could be no longer be turned out – she awoke in the morning, dressed up, took a rapid breakfast, wet to work. Still acute, though, was the pain to enter a cold house in the evening; still anxious her expectations, whenever there was noise on the landing outside, to see him flounce in with his usual careless laugh curling his lips.

But that laughter too, she came slowly to realise, had been a mask. Everything she'd even known about him had been a veil, a façade, a lure.

And thus came the third Christmas.

-

So it was Christmas Eve again, and the flat she'd once shared with him was again trimmed with tinsels and shiny decorations. There was still mistletoe above the entry, and a fir tree in the living-room, casting a dim glow into the darkness. the impression given from outside was that of peacefulness and warmth.

Aoko came carefully in from the kitchen, holding a hot plate of just-out cookies. She had prepared her evening very carefully, selecting a couple of movies she'd been wanting to see for a while without ever finding the time, cooking herself a good Christmas Eve dinner (including, as foretold, cookies), and gift-wrapping in advance the presents she'd bought for her family and friends so that she wouldn't have to do it in a hurry at the very last minute. It was the first time she so prepared Christmas. She hadn't decided it – her unconscious and her body had leagued to divert her from any gloomier thought at the approach of Christmas. They had to sustain her up, since she wouldn't do it for herself; she, after all, was feeding them, so it was the least they could do for her.

Aoko dried her hands on her apron and, untying the ribbon that had gathered her hair, cast a satisfied look on her living-room. There were only two lamps on, plus the tree's light – the perfect atmosphere for watching a film, cuddled up on her couch under a blanket – and therefore the room was rather dark; but it was a warm kind of darkness, soft and comfortable, not the greyish, empty shade, tinted with blue, she had seen there on the night when–

Unconscious kicked in, and she turned hastily away.

The cookies were good – her mother's recipe. She had to remind herself to bring some to her father tomorrow morning. He'd always loved them, but he wasn't as handy with a pan and a spoon as with the Kid Task Force–

Kid…

This time it was her body that reacted, through a sudden elbow move unexpectedly crashing into a stray and innocent glass of water, and thereby ending its career as a glass of water into a million shards on the floor.

"Shit."

By an extraordinary coincidence, it was precisely as she picked up the glass pieces and went to throw them in the in that Aoko caught glimpse of a red flicker fluttering down on her balcony, just outside the window. One second earlier, she wouldn't have seen it; one second later, the gleam of colour would have strayed lost in the windwhirl of snowflakes swirled around in the night.

Red.

In two strides, even before either her body or her unconscious could react, she was sliding the window open. Red had a particular correlation in her mind – two synapses suddenly connecting and relating, triggering an instinct inside her which she couldn't control, even in light of the last events in date.

At first sight, it looked like a red fabric buried in the snow. On second view, however, you could see it was a rose.

A dark red rose, laying on her balcony without any indication or information for its presence there. Its silky petals, delicately curling as if they were carved, were half-covered in white, flower-like snowflakes, and slightly falling at the edges, already withering. Shuddering under the night's cold and icy wind, Aoko stooped to pick it up, dislodging it from its coating of snow. The stem's thorns were still sharp. For a moment, she remained motionless and silent, her fingertips softly brushing against the corolla's velveted material – she felt terribly sad. Never, in the whole past year, had she so much desired to cry, but her eyes burned and no tear would come out. It they had, they would most likely have frozen on the spot;

"Kaito," she called, finally standing and brushing black locks from her face, "come out. I know you're here."

there was only silence for a moment more. Then, with a swift rustling noise, a dark silhouette tumbled down from out of the shade onto her balcony, and it was Kaito leaning backwards against the railing, hands firmly gripping at it. Aoko's eyes rapidly swept on his jeans and black shirt, wild hair, blue eyes. He hadn't changed. Much.

"What do you want?" she snapped at him. His hands' grip around the metal bat tightened a little, but she needn't see that.

"Nothing." He was on his defensive, Poker Face staring at her without blinking. "I just wanted to–" a slight hesitation here, "check up on you."

That sounded so out-of-sense Aoko couldn't help but snarl, "Check up on me – _right_. You've been wanting to _check up on me, when you've been gone away for and entire YEAR?" _and the anger she'd been cooling down for twelve months was surging up inexorably, and the hurt and pain, and she was shouting already, unable to calm down, "_WHEN YOU'VE BEEN LYING TO ME FOR HOW MANY YEARS! YOU DIDN'T CARE A DAMN ABOUT ME BACK THEN, DID YOU, ABOUT I'D FEEL WHEN I'D KNOW THE TRUTH – WHY BEGIN NOW?"_

She caught up her breath, he started to speak, but she cut him in with, "_WHAT MAKES YOU THINK I WANT YOU BACK ANYWAY? I DON'T NEED YOU HERE OR ANYTHING – I WAS PERFECTLY HAPPY WITHOUT YOU!"_ That was a lie and he knew it, but she felt better after yelling it at his face. "_I DON'T NEED YOU AND YOUR LIES, HEAR THAT?"_

"Aoko…"

"_SHUT UP!"_ She was panting. Her whole body was exhausted, as though her was draining her strengths, and she had to make an effort to go on shouting, "_I BET YOU HAD A LOT OF FUN WHE I WAS RAVING ABOUT KID IN HIGH SCHOOL – I BET YOU REALLY HAD YOUR LAUGH AT SEEING ME SO STUPID, JUST LIKE YOU DID – DO MY FATHER! THAT'S IT, YOU'VE HAD YOUR FUN, AND NOW WHAT – WANT MORE?"_

Poker Face snapped away in a blink of an eye, and behind it there was only anger. A dead grip suddenly clutched her hand, and suddenly she was slammed against the railing, effectively pinned down by Kaito's body. He was now standing between her and the faint light coming from her window, and she could only see him in greys and half-shades.

"So that's how you're thinking of me, uh?" he growled furiously "That kind of jerk – you think I was enjoying all this, you think I had fun watching you loathe Kid, loathe _me_, and I just laughed because you couldn't recognise me? Hell Aoko your father has known me since I was seven, he's been chasing me at every Kid heist for five years, and he hasn't identified me! Do you really think I had _fun_?"

"Like hell you did," Aoko snarled. "You love your night heists. You love making fun of my father – of my _father_, Kaito! It's because of you he's never there! Because of you!" She began to struggle against him, punctuating every exclamation with a blow on his chest. "Because of you! Of you!"

"Ao–"

"We were _best friends!_" she yelled desperately. "Best friends are supposed to be able to rely on each other! Best friends are supposed to help each other, no matter what! Best friends…" her chest shook with a sob that wouldn't come out, "best friends are supposed to _trust_ each other!"

"Exactly!" he shouted louder than she. "We've been best friends since we were children! You think I liked it when I knew you hurt and you cried was away because of _me_ – you think I enjoyed myself to know that when you'd discover the truth I would LOSE you? Don't you think I should have needed a good reason for doing what I do, damn it!"

His two hands grasping at the metal railing on each side of her shook it violently. Aoko stilled. Unwittingly, her eyes flickered on Kaito's shaded silhouette hovering over her, taking in the fact that he was much taller than she was now, taking in his shoulders and hands and eyes, taking in his lean figure which could rouse fifty policemen into a tag game on the rooftops. She felt, for the second or third time since they had begun to live together, that Kaito was a man, wholly and completely. Back in high school, he'd been the asexual best friend which she'd never really fantasized on, in spite of all those fangirls goggling over him. But now that he held her pinned down between him and a balcony railing… everything was different.

He misinterpreted her suddenly quivering lips as she stopped to struggle, considered her wide, defiant eyes staring up at him, and finally let out a deep sigh. His hands uncurled from around the metal bar and fell by his side. He was still as close, however, and Aoko felt no better.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I'm sorry for everything. I know I shouldn't have come tonight – I'll only rotten your evening, just like I did last year. I just wanted to… it feels much sillier now… wanted to do this."

His hand lifted and brushed against the skin of her cheek, caressing away a black lock. That took Aoko's breath directly away; she felt as though her lungs had suddenly refused to do their job. That softness, no, that – _tenderness_ had nothing to do with his anger of a minute ago. She had never imagined him to do such a thing and her heart was throbbing real fast, and why was he so much closer all of a sudden?

"You should hit me now," he whispered, and his breath was just over her lips.

She didn't hit him. She half-opened her mouth, though, only to find nothing to say, and after a second's silence Kaito took advantage of those parted lips.

Aoko was stunned. Her body tensed up, standing on tiptoe, fingers curling in the fabric of his shirt. In the few seconds that ensued, two thoughts pierced her mind as acute as silver flashes – first, that it was Kaito Kid currently kissing her, second, that if he ever, ever were to stop, she would most likely burst into tears.

Tentatively – very, tentatively, she tried kissing him back.

The reaction was immediate; he gasped against her lips, then pulled her closer, pinning her down this time against himself, engulfing her. One hand at the back of her head threaded its fingers with her hair, and Aoko found herself responding to his kiss as much as she could, in her present state. He wasn't violent in his moves, but there was something in his embrace, in the way he asked for entrance in her mouth and she let him in without so much as a resistance, that took the breath away from her lungs, reduced it to mere nothingness.

She was feeling dizzy with lack of oxygen, but this could not break the kiss. They were too addicted to it by now to be able to stop willingly. Every time one of the two attempted to breathe away, the other pulled him or her in again, and none found this worth resisting much. What exactly was air, faced with this exquisite sensation of melting with one another? Well, if this was dying, they could die on 'till the end of time, it didn't bother them a hair.

But it seemed that Aoko's unconscious and body were hard at work again, for a long, single tear rolled down her cheek and into her mouth. And this was so surprising – both the tear in itself, and its suddenly salty taste in the sweetness of the kiss – that their lips parted.

They couldn't see much. They dared neither move nor speak, until Kaito shifted positions a bit, lips still millimetres away from her skin, breath playing butterfly kisses up her jaw, against her temple, into her hair. He rested his cheek against it and hugged her tightly, and Aoko let her tears run down at last – without a sob, without a sound, buried as she was in his warmth. There was one hand of his in her hair, caressing it soothingly. He was being so kind and caring that nothing might have happened, he might not have walked out on her – or was it she who'd walked out on him?

"You can hate me if you want," he said, and she knew he'd been thinking the same thing as her. "You can hate me if you want – if it makes you feel better. If it'll make you forget all about how much you hurt, you can hate me."

Aoko was silent for a moment. When she spoke at last, her voice was muffled and almost inaudible.

"… can't…"

"What?" He stopped stroking her hair; there was a certain tension in his body.

She nuzzled against his shirt. "I can't."

He was looking down on her with absolute astonishment, she could feel it without even lifting her eyes. "Aoko…" She wouldn't look up, so he gently took her chin in his hand and forced her to. Her eyes glared into his, defiant, defying.

"I can't. Happy now? I tried all this year, I tried to convince myself so hard – but I – I couldn't. I never could hate you, even in the worst moments. You were always there, damnit! I couldn't even forget you!" She was beginning to tremble slightly, he felt her quivering shoulders under his hands. "God, Kaito, I can't…"

Kaito's mouth crashed against hers for a fraction of second. "Good," he said curtly, while she was recovering from her surprise. "Because I've never been able to stop loving you, thorough all this year."

Aoko stopped shivering. Then, all of a sudden, she relaxed completely against, her body absolutely limp and numb. Kaito panicked for a second, then remarked that her eyes were still wide open.

"Aoko?"

"You'd better tell me everything." She clutched at his shirt possessively and looked up into his face. "From now on. Everything you've never told me – the reason for everything. I don't… don't want to be lied to again." Then she broke into a smile for the first time, and Kaito thought, it illuminated her face. "And then, you may be treated with cookies."

-

**Happy Christmas Eve! Gomen, gomen – tomorrow I may be rather late at updating. In fact, I may update only the day after – on the 26****th****. I'll try my best not to, but then, Christmas day will be a bit hectic. Anyway, merry Christmas!**


	12. Making Up For Lost Time

**Author's note: Gosh, I'm sorry! I'm really, really late (looks down). But Christmas Day was, er – Christmas Day. I didn't get a peek at the computer in three days. Anyway, in order to bid forgiveness, here's the last shot of my Christmas series – Shinichi and Ran, of course. Yep – and then I'm done.**

**No ownie. Alas.**

**-**

**Making Up For Lost Time**

**-**

The crowd being that night what it always is – dense and packed and Christmas-nervous – they could very easily have missed each other. They could have walked only two yards to the side and have never seen one another, due to the amount of grumbling, pushing people there would have been separating them. They could have walked past and never known what opportunity they would have missed, had they not been walking on the exact same line – like a thin red thread joining them, linking them in the distance.

They caught sight of each other a few steps apart, when there was no longer space enough to elude each other, and both immediately changed countenance – Shinichi turning pale, Ran turning red. The same memory flashed through their minds at the same moment – and then they were facing in the crowd, awkwardly entering into conversation.

Said conversation was very likely to plummet fast to almost complete nothingness. Embarrassment was already piercing through the usual asking after one's family and health, threatening every fragile question to lapse eventually into silence. How were you supposed to react when your last meeting dated back to – god, over a year already – and had been but a long, violent fight?

"Hm – I saw the famous trial," Shinichi said, with a clumsy smile – it was all that he could think of at the moment. "I recorded a transmission of it. You were… you were great. I never thought… your mother must have been very surprised."

"Yes, she was," Ran said, chuckling awkwardly. "I, hm… followed your latest case, the one of the drowned man… I thought the sister had done it. I was actually mad when you deduced it was the best friend," she laughed a little. The mere sight of that laugh surprised Shinichi – there was no likeliness between the Ran from last time, who sworn to loathe him forever, and tonight's Ran, embarrassed and shy.

The danger now was the silence. It was falling rapidly, isolating them within the crowd, amongst all the people pushing past them and grumbling about their immobility. They were all going to a merry familial Christmas Eve dinner, going to wrap gifts and send newsletters, to the glow of candles in the tree and the sweetness of candy – they had no business with two young people who kept in almost absolute silence and put an obstacle to their progressing mainstream. The had had a nice, joyful evening in perspective…

"… you doing something tonight?" Shinichi couldn't help asking. He saw her look up in surprise, and knew it was silly of him; of course she was doing something on Christmas Eve. How could he hope to draw her away from her family, probably her friends, only to stay with him?

"Hum… no."

Hope rocketed upwards, though he tried desperately to ignore it.

"That is, tomorrow morning I'll go eat at my parents' and Sonoko had to move her Christmas party to Christmas Day because there was some any people who couldn't make it on the 24th–" she hesitated, and stopped. She looked… a mixture of expectant and fearful, as though she wasn't quite sure what was to come.

"Well, then…" he scratched the back of his head, hoping that all the emotions that had agitated him all the time she'd spoken didn't show too openly on his face, "there is a nice ramen store just two streets away… I was going there. If you don't have anything planned tonight – would you like to–?" He waited breathlessly for her answer, hope swelling in a balloon way, all ready to… explode. She was hesitating, one hand clutching at the other arm.

"No one should be alone at Christmas," he added with a rapid smile that let nothing show through as to whether he referred to her or to himself.

She smiled, too, a much more genuine smile, the smile of the child she had been. "I should… very much like to come," she said, letting go of her arm. She was adorable, thought Shinichi, in a leaves-brown coat with her dark hair half inside if and half out, stray locks caressing her cold-rosied cheeks. Like every time he saw her since he was fifteen, he remembered why he was – still – in love with her.

They walked down the illuminated avenue, not speaking much, and, when they did, speaking softly. It wasn't easy – not knowing what to say, or rather not knowing how to formulate what they did want to say. Little by little, however, random anecdote after random anecdote, they did put up a conversation and sustained it all the way to the ramen store.

It was almost empty, but for a man sitting at the far end of the row of seats, who was toying with a glass of sherry and gazing thoughtfully into space. They wind swished past them as they settled, making the red veils behind their heads flap and tangle up lightly.

"Ah, Shinichi-kun, nice to see you," an old man with a crouched back and a wry smile said, coming up. He was the splitting image of how a ramen storeowner should be, Ran thought; he was even drying a glass on a white towel, which he thereupon flung over his arm. "I didn't think I'd see you tonight." His eyes slid swiftly to Ran and back again. "What will it be?"

"Same as always for me," Shinichi said rapidly. "As for Ran…" he let the sentence trail off and was glad that she immediately took up,

"Oh, don't bother about me, please. I'll take the same as Shinichi."

The owner bestowed her one of his wrinkled smiles and hobbled away. He hadn't asked ac single question. That was the best thing about that man: his discretion. It probably was necessary in his job. Besides, Shinichi had eaten at the place long enough to be certain he wouldn't enquire after something beyond his own business.

"… you come here many times?" Ran was asking.

"What? Oh yeah," Shinichi emerged, "yes, I've been eating here at least once a week for the past last months. It's a nice place. A bit chilly," (he'd remarked she was shivering), "but that'll pass on when you eat. And they're making the best ramen I've ever tasted – apart," he added without thinking, "from yours."

Ran froze for a fraction of second. Shinichi could have kicked himself – because, of course, the only times when he'd witnessed her cooking such things as ramen was as Conan.

"Hum – so how's your latest case going?" she asked suddenly, in too fast and too high-pitched a voice to be true. She didn't want to talk about that. Very well. That was fine with him. He plunged with passion into the retaliation of the murder case he was investigating, and had gone as far as the description of suspects when the owner placed two large bowls on the desk before them.

"Gin, Shinichi-kun? What's yours, miss?"

"Ah – water, please," said Ran, who'd started. She waited until they'd been served and he was out of hearing to mouth, "_Gin?"_

"Hmm." Shinichi was looking onto the counter as he took a sip. "Curiously, I've taken a fancy into that drink. It's not bad stuff." he tilted the glass to the side and frowned at the golden liquid swaying to and fro. "I _do_ wonder what that guy'd think about it, though…"

A pause. Then, "You really don't want to forget, do you?" The voice was so angry and so low he almost didn't hear her out, but when he looked up she was already back to herself, absently turning one of her chopsticks in her ramen bowl.

"Hey, it's good!" she exclaimed, a smile lighting up her face. She expertedly swirled noodles around her and lifted them to her mouth; Shinichi imitated her, disconcerted.

"What I don't get about your case," she added when he'd laid the whole matter before her, with its flaws and holes, "is that even if that servant person did it, as the police says, then why did she took away the proofs? Not only they didn't accuse her, but it would have been simple to put the blame on somebody else instead. She had the keys to enter all the bedrooms, didn't she? And even if she wasn't _that _smart, she would never have forgotten to put on gloves – you see that precaution everywhere in books and movies."

"So you'd think," Shinichi murmured, picking up a piece of surimi.

"_You_ think she's done the murder, then?" Ran's tone was accusative.

"I said nothing of the kind."

Ran eyed him suspiciously. "There still is something you haven't told me, isn't there?" and Shinichi began to laugh. It was incredible being able to talk to her again, argue with her, see her pout at him with those half-moon eyes like she was giving him right now.

"No, I told you everything I know. I'm just looking into the matter under another perspective. Listen, there's only one of the suspects who could have done it _and_ hidden the proofs away _and_ made up an alibi. You just have to eliminate everything that's impossible, just like you did during that case at the convenience store…"

Shit. It was his first chance in months, maybe the only one he'd ever get, to make up with her, and he was _screwing_ it up. But – he thought bitterly – it was silly to have hoped that, somehow, they could pretend nothing had happened, to have hoped that they could make up for lost time, to have _hoped_ that the phantom of _Conan-kun_ would not rise between them.

Two men in business suits settled some seats away, ordering drinks and discussing work. Them, as well as the man from before, had probably no lit home to go back to, no family to welcome them with good dinner and Christmas presents. And themselves, Shinichi thought, would have known the same dull evening, had they not collided once more. And now, he understood, now that he had a small, tiny chance of warmth, he dreaded to return to the coldness of his deserted house. After the glow of Ran's smile and laughter, the loss would be doubly felt…

"–at the convenience store," he said firmly. If she wanted to take that chance as much as he did, she would have to do it and accept the load it represented. They couldn't very well pretend nothing had happened, not when they had gone as far as to build such an emotional tension between. Like a wall of glass ready to crack.

Ran made no comment. She ate on, and talked on, and accepted that he should walk her back home. "It's not far. A couple of blocks away."

Shinichi was feeling a bit dizzy. He had not drunk much, but Ran's presence beside him was enough to intoxicate him, despite all his inner protests that he should not permit himself to feel so. She was walking by his side, not too close but not too far either, and he could hear the vibrations of her voice in the chilling air, see the glow the cold brought up to her cheeks and her long wave of brown hair swaying on her shoulders, scent her perfume when a stray step drew her closer to him. All his senses were in acute and almost painful perception of everything that was her, everything he'd missed so much.

When he realised they had walked up the two or three blocks and a couple of staircases, and were standing on her doorstep, facing each other, and looked at Ran fidgeting on her threshold, nervous twiddling her keys, he thought maybe it was best to leave it there. On a good memory. "Well," he said with a quiet smile, "it was a nice evening." He marked a pause for her to answer, but she barely looked up at him and mouthed her approbation in a few unintelligible words. "Okay, then…" He wanted to hug her, kiss her, wrap her up– "I'll leave you there. Bye."

He turned on his heels, towards the stairs, feeling that, yes, it was the best way, that, at least, they would have a nice last evening to remember them by, instead of all last time's shouts – until Ran's voice stopped him in mid-track.

"Shinichi?"

He turned slowly back to her, trying to keep hope from making saltos in his stomach. "Yes?"

She refused to meet his gaze. "Would you like to… I mean… if you don't have anything else to do tonight," she was talking precipitately, her eyes glued to his chest. "I was wondering whether you'd like to… dunno, come up and have a drink?" She looked herself ashamed of her own proposition.

Shinichi drew in a deep breath, trying to cool down. "Are you sure–"

Ran seemed to regain some assurance at seeing him hesitate. She gave him one of her truly hearty smiles, bittersweet but genuine, and added, "No one should be alone at Christmas." As well, leaving the doubt upon whether she was talking about him or her – or both. Shinichi finally broke into a smile as well.

"I'd love to."

For a moment, Ran looked as though she was about to fling her arms around his neck. Recovering herself, however, she pushed the door open and let him in.

"I'm afraid it isn't very large," she excused herself, seeing that he looked around with interest. "But it's nice, you know – home."

No, it wasn't a very large flat, Shinichi thought – they were in the living-room, and this door must lead to a bedroom, plus a kitchen and shower place – just enough for one person to live at ease. But the walls were covered with warm colours, and, when the lights were on, even partly, it conferred to the place an atmosphere of cosiness and warmth which felt exactly like Ran.

"What do you want to drink?" Ran asked, coming up after she'd put their cloaks away. "I'm afraid I don't have alcohol, but tea, coffee…?"

""Tea would be nice," Shinichi agreed, and with a 'Put yourself at ease,' she disappeared into the kitchen.

Ran evidently spent a great deal of time within these walls. Her scent was all over the place. Items and pieces of furniture all talked about her – of her habits, her leisure, the small events of her wakened life. _She_ had chosen them as the companions of her solitude, _she _use them on a daily basis, making them, in a way, part of her. They didn't only speak of her, but felt like her, _were_ her.

An open book laying on the kotatsu caught his eye. He picked it up. It was a photo album. Photos that had been taken during that 'Dark Knight and Princess Heart' play – some of those, he remembered, had been taken by Jodie-sensei – or by Vermouth, aka Araide. He went on forward, to the latest pages, the latest pictures. –Her parents. Sonoko and her. A bunch of friends he didn't know, probably from college.

He leafed back through, listening to the soft noises coming out from the kitchen and to Ran's light humming, and was in for a shock. It was his face beaming up at him from that picture, his face which he wholly and painfully recognised – childish features, eyes very blue and frowning behind thick-mounted glasses. And those were everywhere on the neighbouring pages.

The Conan days. He stared, astonished, at all the pictures tracing them out, those months and months of hiding and disguising reunited in his hands right now. The very ones he'd thought she'd wanted to forget most of all, he found in an album she was evidently consulting often… he flipped backward and forward in time, staring at cases he didn't even remember what had all been about, and faces – Nemuri no Kogoro and Hattori and Kaito Kid and Megure-keibu and the Shounein Tantei and police inspectors and himself as Conan… and Ran, almost everywhere, always smiling, always strong and compassionate. Always sisterly. Always lied to.

He slowly laid back the album onto the kotatsu.

When Ran came back from the kitchen, a tray in her hands with cups, a jug of milk, and a kettle, she found him standing by her desk, holding and considering a picture. Drying her hands on a towel, she joined him. It was the usual framed picture of the two of them at Tropical Land, grinning at the camera and looking as young and joyful as the two teenagers thy were supposed to be;

"Good old times, ne?" she said, and her voice seemed to startle him. He turned his head to her, sharply, stiffening, then immediately relaxed. His fingers trailed one second on the frame's glass then put it firmly back down.

"Yes," he said. "Good old times."

It was on that day, he thought, glancing back at the photo as he settled in one of her armchairs, that their lives had been thrown over. It was on that day that he'd been turned into Conan, on that day that had begun the whole years-lasting masquerade of lies and disguises. It was the last truly happy moment they'd spent together. During the Conan times, Ran had cherished that picture as a way to remember him by, while he was much closer than she imagined – but he ha never thought she'd have preserved it afterwards.

Ran had always been an excellent cook, and her tea was well-known in the neighbourhood, among the family's friends and acquaintances. She served it not only to them, but to her father's costumers, and chiefly all had grandly appreciated its depth and richness. It was bitter in taste, soft in texture, a light green-brown in shade as the sugar bits slowly dissolved into the liquid, mixing, melting with it. For a moment after the first sip, Shinichi simply held his mug in his hands, enjoying its warmth, while the familiar drink ran down his throat, bringing up shards of memory and then disappearing with them.

"Still as delicious as ever," he commented with a small smile at Ran, who flushed a very pretty shade of pink.

"… thank you." She drank in silence. It was incredible, he reflected, how yesterday still he had given up all hopes from that part, and was concentrating all his life on his job, solving cases and murders and thefts and enigmas until he got drunken with it – and now he was sitting in all the comfort and the peace of a warm sitting room and armchair, and Ran – _Ran_ – was smiling at him over her cup of tea.

"So tell me," he settled more comfortably against the cushion, "how are things going since the Trial?" He somehow managed to say it with a capital T, since this was how he thought about it now. "What did your mom say about your intervention?"

"She was mad," Ran admitted. "Said a trainee should never have interrupted the procurer because they didn't agree with him."

"But you were right," Shinichi protested. "That old beast was half potty anyway. He was going to send an innocent to the gallows, and if you hadn't stood up none of those who backed you up would have done it instead of you. It was obvious the lead was wrong – simply by listening at the evidence I could see the flaws in his reasoning.

"But _you_ are a great detective," Ran reminded him softly. She went on, without appearing to remark that two of his brainwaves were currently colliding en suite of what she had just said, "so I guess I'll have to go on college for a few more years. Then I can work at my mom's for a while, and then…" she shrugged, "I'll see. Nothing's definite yet."

"Did Kisaki-san help you out for that flat?" Shinichi asked, nodding at the walls. "How long have you been living here?"

"Eight or nine months, I'd think," Ran said, frowning. "It's really a good place. It's not very large, it's no very practical either, but I've got a nice quarter, nice neighbours…"

"… nice view," Shinichi added, standing up and walking to the window, whereupon he stopped and contemplated the town in the Christmas decorated night. "You can perfectly see the avenues and Haido Park from here."

It was at that precise moment (lynch me for coincidences if you wish) that the clock tower began to ring midnight. Slowly, one by one, following the cadence, all the town's bells set in motion after those, striking each note with strength and volume, leaving each deep, profound sound to echo on through the still air and, finally, die away.

It was only when they all lapsed into silence that Shinichi realized that his Christmas Eve, which he had foreseen as dull and lonesome first at the ramen store than at his own cold house, had elapsed away before he only knew about it.

"Merry Christmas, Ran," he said, turning back to her with a smile.

"Merry Christmas," she said, and had there not been an imperceptible quiver in her voice he would have looked back at the window and would never have seen the tears now filling up her eyes, rolling down her cheeks, dropping, as fleeing as a silver-blue glint, onto her folded hands.

In half a second he shot through the room, was sitting on the couch beside her, and hesitantly wrapped his arm around her. "Ran – please, don't cry… don't cry like that…" His voice was soft and gently soothing, and soon afterwards he felt Ran relax sensibly against him. Her head bent down to the curve of his neck, sobbing rather violently; she was clutching at his shirt, he could feel her nails burying in the fabric. Her crying was so violent she was shaking, even after he slid an arm around her waist to cradle her against him.

One of his hands was in her neck, caressing her hair, and he felt her precipitate pulse under his fingers. In that position, he could sense the smallest of her moves – the changes of her breath when her lips quivered, the imperceptible shudder of her shoulders while she leant into him, the featherlike brush of her hair against his neck and jaw. She was sobbing out words now, grasping at him as though afraid he could slip away.

"I missed you… I missed you – so much…" she swallowed, "so _much_…"

"Shh," Shinichi hushed her softly. "It's okay… see? I'm here… It's okay, Ran… I'm not leaving again…" Her touched the top of her head with a butterfly kiss which she probably didn't feel, but after some time of sobbing and whimpering in his shirt she began to calm down. She was shaking less, and he suspected her tears had dried away by now, but she didn't let go… for a moment she let herself sink completely against him, breathing in rhythm with him.

How long exactly they remained in that awkward position was difficult to say. It could not have been more than a few minutes, and yet it felt like stretched hours to Shinichi when his brain cells started working again. Until then it had only been instinct, but now he could realise how warm and peaceful was their embrace, and how totally unexpected.

At last, Ran drew back, slowly disentangling herself from his arms. "God, I'm sorry…" she murmured rubbing her face, "I completely broke down, didn't I–" She stopped, and gazed up at him with her lips half-open and her cheeks slightly pinked. She hesitated a second, and then looked as though she was throwing herself forward– "Shinichi, would you kiss me?"

Shinichi was silent with stupefaction. She bit her lip and went on, her voice somehow more disconnected, "I mean… only to… make me feel better?"

Shinichi looked at her. The strength she had displayed all evening had not vanished – her eyes were holding the gaze defiantly, and there was determination in the curves of her mouth – but her little crying session had torn it in two, and through the flickering folds of the veil he imagined it to be, he saw pain and sadness and that wretchedness she had been attempting too hide.

"Sure," he murmured. Her shoulder fell for a second, as though she relaxed and tensed again. She looked like she could shatter down any moment, at any rushing gesture. Slowly, taking care never to hurt or frighten her, Shinichi brushed aside the locks that fell on her face, then let his hand fell in the curve of her neck, his fingers threading with her hair.

"Close your eyes," he whispered, just before their lips finally touched.

A first kiss is always clumsy. Both of them knew – more or less – what to do, but ignored how to do it; and at first they remained like that, bodies parted, barely touching. It felt much, much more awkward than they'd thought.

Then Shinichi slid his arms around her again, and deepened the kiss by pulling her closer. Ran gasped in surprise, clutched at his shoulder, and he feared he'd gone too far, he'd hurt her too much… until she hooked her arms around his neck and began thoroughly kissing him back. Encouraged, he went further, caressing her mouth, exploring it, pulling her closer and closer still. He felt more than heard her moan softly against his lips, but she wasn't pushing him away – in fact, she was pulling him down with all her might.

It was nonetheless a very soft kiss and it didn't last long. And Ran, if possible, looked more desperate at the end of it than at the beginning. "Feeling better?" Shinichi asked softly.

He saw her shatter before his eyes.

"Yes," she said, turning away abruptly. "Thank you."

A rapid smile flew on Shinichi's lips as he caught her hand and pulled her back to him. She gave a little yelp of surprise and her nose crashed in his shirt, where, with his arms once more around her and his hands in her back, he kept her it so.

"Shinichi…" she looked up, puzzlement visible in her eyes. He smiled down at her – how any times had he dreamt to hold her so?

"My turn to ask now." He left her no time to express her incomprehension; he banged his forehead against hers and whispered, "Can I kiss you, Mouri Ran?" Her eyes widened and her mouth opened, silently. Shinichi brushed his lips against her temple then trailed down to her ear.

"Can I kiss you?"

He raised his head just in time to see her smile. "… yes."

-

Ran's first thought was to wonder why she was sleeping fully dressed. And on the couch, of all places. Since when – she hadn't opened her eyes yet, but she felt that somehow doing so would overwhelm every known mark in her life, so she wouldn't, for the moment – was the couch so warm, and its embrace so strong.

She drew in a deep breath and shifted to a more comfortable position, receiving a groan in answer. Her hand met something warm. Fingers. She squeezed them. They squeezed back. Ran smiled and snuggled against said couch, drifting off again in delicious slumber…

Wait. Stop. Backtrack.

She opened her eyes, hurriedly enough.

…

Okay, Shinichi made a good pillow. Nice to know that, a part of Ran's brain registered. Another part was presently yelling in shock. A third, paradoxically, was staring at him and thinking… god, he _was_ good-looking… even fast asleep, even with that childish pout that said he was dreaming, he could make her heart skip one… no, quite a number of beats actually.

"Shinichi," she breathed. He didn't stir a hair. He must have been very tired. She stole a peck from his lips and uncurled her limbs from his, wincing when blood flooded in her long-still muscles.

Outside, the sky was a darkish grey. Winter dawn. She looked down onto the street, cold and deserted in this morning embryo. There was no remnant f yesterday evening's animation and festivity, the lights were still – or already – off, and yet…

"It's Christmas," she thought, and it was like a treat she hadn't expected, a present she hadn't dared dream about.

The phone rang – a light trilling tune, piercing through the morning air. Sonoko. Only Sonoko called her this early in the morning. She picked it up before it woke up half the building. Or Shinichi.

"Hello? Yes, Sonoko, Merry Christmas! … yes, of course I'll be there. Oh, and by the way, could I – hn. Yes, Sonoko – oh, come on…" (this muttered under her breath. In the corner of her eye, she saw Shinichi stir and sit up drowsily.) "Sonoko, I wanted to ask you… what? Kazuha-chan? no, I have no idea. Around for o' clock, I guess." She turned back to the window, sighing. This was going to take ages. "Hm… mm… what? why? … oh, I see… well, speaking of which." She marked a pause (but that was only because arms encircled her from behind and Shinichi's breath began to play in her hair), and surprisingly, Sonoko didn't fill in.

"Can I bring someone to the party?"

-

'**Tis the end, ladies and gentlemen! A rather late end, but I hope you liked it anyway. I liked writing it – it made me forget that Christmas wasn't until another year. I hope it did you too!**

**To all those who reviewed, **_**thank you**_**. You're wonderful, and I hope I didn't disappoint you too much by being so late! Thank you very much! Bye!**


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